Chaos Bond
by DaydreamingDuma
Summary: Situations in life may be changing but that doesn't mean the heroes are ready to retire. Not with their enemies unaccounted for. But while some contemplate the idea of leaving behind a legacy, there is still one other question: Is it finally time to find out what exactly links Sonic, Shadow and Silver together? All-Star Cast. Sequel to Chaos Born.
1. The Prologue

**Writer's Note - **

**Welcome to the long anticipated sequel to Chaos Born. The only reason this story has been uploaded was because of the enormous support I received from the first story and I would like to thank you for that.  
So a big welcome to new readers and a big welcome back to old readers.**

**Stay awesome guys!  
-Duma**

* * *

Metal walls. Walls that curved up and round to form a huge empty tunnel. Metal walls of a metal tunnel down which a lamentatious groan of wind could be quietly heard, a weak echo of the blustery world far away.

"_Foolish wind. I hate it. It serves an unworthy master."_

A network of cables and wires and pipes sprawled over the floor like a topographical view of some river delta but where rivers would have ran to the sea, this splurge of cables all linked up to a humming generator and from that to a series of old brick-like computer screens which may have once upon a time been treasured family appliances many years back. Now they had been recruited from scrap heaps and recycling centres to have their systems pulled out and pulled apart, to be upgraded and revamped to perform a new task for a new user. All while they bleeped and buzzed, processing data meant for newer, sleeker computers, the constant wind droned on and on and on.

"_I hate it. I hate the wind. It serves an unworthy master._"

Down the curved metal walls ran the wires and across the dusty metal floor and around red metal feet...

"_I hate it,_" Metal Sonic went on thinking in his head, rage and frustration fuelling his willpower as he battled with the files that were being read out on the computers. The screens fizzed a bit with static but Metal Sonic went on perservering, realising that he was as stubborn to achieve his goals as his organic template. Such a thought only angered him more and, at long last, the files cracked and a flood of new information presented itself before him.

On the screens, file names began to appear and they were all ready to be opened.

"**Y-Y-Y-You/ have done it?**" chirped a synethtic child-like voice down at Metal's feet. "**You h-h-have/ done it?" **The voice, so innocent and yet so sinister, reverberated with a crackling sound not unlike interferance on a microphone. It belonged to the Tails Doll, sat obediently at Metal Sonic's feet like a trained pup, his felted head lolling back against the robot hedgehog's sturdy leg.

"**20 years worth of encrypted codes, firewalls and security systems cannot keep me from a deadlock file**," Metal Sonic replied, lifting a clawed fist in triumph as he pulled the wires that he had plugged into himself during the code-cracking process. He felt Tails Doll's head lurch forward as the small 'toy' began to creep up Metal Sonic's body to latch itself to his shoulder, tapping his robotic brother with his antennae as he went.

"**You're in! You're in! At last! W-W-We're/ / in! We're in!" **he sang softly, pushing his face against Metal Sonic and tapping him affectionately.

More metal appeared as the final member of the robotic brotherhood came stepping from the darkness of the tunnel, his joints grinding painfully with every stride.

**"Would have been sooner if we used a G.U.N. computer," **Metal Knuckles felt the need to say, lifting his huge claws and welcoming Tails Doll's antennae which provided him with a surge of refreshing energy to recharge his systems. The robotic echidna's voice was raspy, probably due to the fact that many years worth of dust had clogged his audio systems. If he'd been organic, someone may have come to the assumption that he was a heavy smoker.

"**We needed this to be secret**," Metal Sonic reminded him, "**If we used the G.U.N. computers, we would have been found."**

**"It is well enough that Dr Robotnik's database could be downloaded into Tails Doll**." Metal Knuckles nodded his head appreciatively at the floppy fox robot who's empty stare gave no impression that he was grateful for the compliment.

Metal Sonic's optics briefly flickered to Metal Knuckles. "**You have been gone a long time. Have you done what you wanted?"**

Metal Knuckles produced a _whirr_ of satisfaction. "**My mission was a success**."

For four years, Metal Sonic, Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll had hidden themselves away in the remains of an underground resistance base found beneath the ruins of a radioactive power plant belonging to Eggman not far from Scrap Brain Zone. The whole area was deemed too dangerous for civilians and it had been abandoned as a ghost town by the military forces. The resistance group that had used the base had cleared out shortly after the attack from Infinite a long time ago and only a few homeless beggers were found littering the tunnels which the three robots had made short but messy work of. Since breaking from the control of the Robotnik family and escaping the destruction of Christmas Isle with the downloaded data from the facility, they had been working on breaking through the deadlocks that were inaccessible to even the Commander of the G.U.N.

_##GuardianUnitsofNationsDatabase####DeadlockFilesAccess##_

_###ERROR###ACCESSDENIED###ERROR####_

_#ACCESSGRANTED#_

_~Data Retrieval~ _

_Data Retrieved:_

_File:SouthIslandFile:DrIvoJulianRobotnikFile:Robotropolis_

_File:SonicTheHedgehogFile:DNAStorageFile:ProjectShadow_

_File:SonicTheHedgehogFile:DNAStorageFile:ProjectSilver_

Tails Doll squeaked excitedly and Metal Knuckles's green optics twinkled with interest as he stepped up beside Metal Sonic and watched his team leader open up the first file which turned out to be hazy black and white photos of Mobotropolis before Robotnik invaded it and accompanying documents and newspaper articles. For robots, it didn't take them long to read everything.

**"...Time travellers?**" Metal Knuckles repeated uncertainly.

"**From the past**," Metal Sonic growled and narrowed his gaze at the screen. "**The humans of Space Colony Ark**."

"**You mean to tell me those foolish flesh bags managed to tamper with the fabrics of space-time?**" Metal Knuckles spoke. Had his robotic voice been capable of portraying emotion, it would have been riddled with disgust.

"**Not only tamper but penetrate it**." Metal Sonic pointed a lethal claw at the screen. "'**Following what appeared to be a freak storm, reports came to say that a group of approximately 5 travellers appeared as though emerging from ripples of visible air on the outskirts of Robotropolis, then called Mobotropolis'**," he read, "'**and it was only for the reason that several witnesses all confirmed such a statement that modern day scientists have thus brought forth the theory of Time Travel. What purpose the travellers had come for, few seem to know as Robotropolis was declared a 'Forbidden City' by the South Island Council just weeks after Dr Robotnik invaded in the late 1900's.**'"

"**And the true reason as to why they were there**?" Metal Knuckles grunted.

As if to answer him, Metal Sonic selected the next deadlocked file to only be presented with a series of video logs recorded by none other than Professor Robotnik, Dr Eggman's grandfather. He was looking healthier than he had been in his later years of life and when he spoke, he did so with an eagerness, an energy that was waiting to delve into science, a familiar spark that seemed to light a fire under all mad scientists and one that would only be too easily passed on to the professor's grandson, Ivo Robotnik, in years to come.

"_-evious attempts to create Ultimate life. We call it the Biolizard but it remains as a reminder to us how far we are from achieving our goals. I fear... I fear that there simply will never be a creature that can utilise the power of Chaos at will. The secrets to such a feat remain buried with the extinct Echidna species and their ancient prophecies will never be fulfilled. But if only for my granddaugh-"_

_"-the answer that might have eluded us all these years! Our work in the science of traversing space-time may unintentially show us the way. The murals found in the arcitecture of the Mystic Ruins are over 4000 years old but are still legible and our many months of trying to decifer the meaning behind it has left us with one conclusion: the only other people to have spiritual connections to the powers of Chaos are Hedgehogs, a species that ruled the planet alongside Echidnas before the fall of that great civilisation-"_

_"-e no record of one as blue as the mural would have us believe and many of my scientists are ready to admit that we have been mistaken and the creature from the mural has been misidentified. I can be in no doubt, however. We continue to scoure the timeline in search of-"_

_"-owing closer and closer. With fine-tuning, our instruments may yet reveal-"_

_"-ound it! The missing piece of the puzzle! Data shows that the subject will not be born for decades to come but it is enough for our science! We have only to discover the coordinates and a team will be assembled to collect the nessessary samples that will finally unlock the key to creating the Ultimate Lifeform. Maria may yet be saved!"_

Metal Sonic, had he a mouth, would have sneered at the video screen and at the big-headed human that sat there talking away to himself. Most of his synthetic life was filled with utter contempt for organics and their petty emotions and all the weaknesses that went with them but... Well, there was a little part of Metal Sonic that, dare he even think it, harboured some pride over the fact that he had been modelled in the image of a hedgehog.

Modelled in the image of the very hedgehog that this so-called man of science believed to hold the genetic key to achieve 'ultimate' life.

_"A success. With the subject that we believed to have been 'chaos born' captured and the samples extracted, we have been able to aquire all that we need though we have been forced to abandon the subject. I pray that his memory has been sufficiently tampered with so that he will not recall anything of himself before our arrival."_

Tails Doll let out a soft whine and his head sagged over Metal Sonic's shoulder, his dead black eyes fixated on the next file, all too eager or nosy to see what secrets they held. It was even shorter than the previous two; just a photocopy of a short letter.

_"Dr Silo,_

_I am writing to inform you that our agents have been successful in aquiring all samples found in the possession of the Robotnik family. The Hedgehog DNA, which we believe to have been used for the classified 'Project Shadow', is now on its way to your facility where we have been assured that it will be safely stored until there comes a time when 'Project Silver' can begin._

_Regards,_

_Dr Von Shlemmer"_

Metal Knuckles's throat gave a creak as he turned his neck. "**What now**?" he asked.

"...**We want to be rid of all our enemies**," Metal Sonic answered him, "**With the right equipment, I may destroy three hedgehogs with one fatal blow. But we must be sure of this information and the only way I can confirm it is by journeying to the future**."

Tails Doll awkwardly lifted his head. "**Q-Q-Query: How/ are you going to do that? Little Planet is not due to appear-ear in the a-a-area for/ many months and that's where the Time Stones are**."

Metal Sonic reached up and took Tails Doll into his hands, assessing his weight and density, feeling the circuitry and electricity that coursed through the body.

"**I won't use the Time Stones**," the robot hedgehog simply replied and, giving the Doll a quick pat on the head, turned to the robot echidna. "**Metal Knuckles, what was it that you took time away to do?"**

Metal Knuckles took a second to admire his long sharp hand blades before answering. "**It has been four years. I have updated information on our enemies**."

Tails Doll heard the sharp hiss that came from Metal Sonic as the robot's optics flickered in a dangerous rage. **"...Sonic has been barring me for all that time**."

"**Selfish. Selfish. Selfish**," Tails Doll sang, letting his antennae glow.

"**What then have you to report**?"

Metal Knuckles gave an annoyed grunt.

"...**My Inferior has already pro-created an offspring**." He made eye contact with Metal Sonic. "**It would seem that **_**your**_** Inferior is about to do the same**."


	2. A New Story Begins

**Writer's Note - For any new readers, I have to prewarn that this story contains SonicXAmy, TailsxZooey, KnucklesXRouge and SilverXBlaze.  
I will therefore apologise to readers who do not ship those particular pairings but I don't tend to focus on romance and these are only established pairings needed for the plot.  
(Another thing to bear in mind is that, in this timeline of events, TailsxCosmo has been a thing - please see the prequel, Chaos Born, for further details. Thanks!)  
-Duma**

* * *

A New Story Begins

Finishing his juice, Knuckles took up the Mobius Monthly and disinterestedly cast his gaze over various articles about current events and only briefly took interest in anything that looked as though it might involve him. There was always a small section on page 7 of the magazine called 'Angel Island Tracker' where readers could keep up to date with where some people believed the floating isle to be located at various times of the year. This month, according to eye witnesses and atmospheric scientists, Angel Island was passing by the West Coast of Metropolis before it was most likely to return to the coast off the Mystic Ruins. They were correct.

The magazine then buckled as a weight descended upon him from above and suddenly there in Knuckles' lap was a small, podgy little puggle which looked up at him in delight. Ruby-Lei was 3 years old now and had all the charm and personality to go with it. With her rich red fur and her dainty white cresent on her chest, she was the spitting image of her father in every way except for her white-tipped locks and her mother's teal coloured eyes.

To find her appearing in his lap and crushing the magazine took Knuckles by surprise and he looked up at his wife who had deposited her on him.

"Here you go," Rouge smiled. She had her coat on and a bag was slung over her elbow as she stepped over to the nearest mirror to check her hair and makeup.

"Pardon?"

"I'm working today, remember?" Rouge said, brushing her shoulders.

Knuckles felt alarm bells ringing in his head. "You finished your Work Leave?"

"Time flies when you're having fun, hey sweetie?" Rouge smiled, "Anyway, there's your kid. Don't let her walk off the edge of Angel Island will you? I'll see you when I get back." She briefly dug through her bag to make sure she'd remembered to pick up her essentials.

"But," Knuckles protested as Ruby, dressed in nothing but her nappy (diaper), began to slide down her father's legs, "I thought we usually get a Sitter? What if the Master Emerald needs me? Besides I've not actually looked after her by myself before since she learnt to climb."

Boy, had that been a nightmare: walking in to find Ruby halfway up her nursery wall.

"Neither have I. You be sure to tell me what it's like, won't you? But you can pretend I'm still in the house. You're good at that aren't you?" Rouge stood by Knuckles' armchair and grinned at his large purple eyes. "Hee hee. You're such a cutie."

"And if there's an emergency?"

"Then you're lucky you have so many friends that can come and help you out." Rouge checked her watch and then the clock on the wall for good measure. "Look, I'm going to be late if I don't leave now. If you're really in a stew, drop her off with Shade or something. She's an echidna."

Knuckles glanced sadly at his daughter as she climbed back up his legs to slide down again. "Shade's on vacation and she wouldn't want Ruby anyway."

"Fine!" Rouge sighed, beginning to get annoyed, "Pawn her off on Tails or Amy! Stop keeping me from going to work. I'll bring food home. See ya!" She blew a kiss to the puggle. "Be good for daddy."

"Bye Ma!" Ruby called, waving a fist, "Bye Ma! Bye bye!"

Knuckles stood at the window of their house under the shrine with Ruby in his arms, watching as Rouge took to the skies outside and flew out of sight beyond the trees. Ruby waved until she couldn't see her mother and then, after a twinge of sadness, turned to her father expectantly, as though he had some magical cure for this mild seperation anxiety.

"So it's just you and me, pug," Knuckles grunted, sitting back down in his chair and plopping the little echidna on his legs, "Think we'll survive?"

Ruby considerd the question for a second and nodded dramatically. "Ya."

"Atta girl," Knuckles smiled, stroking his daughter's head, "Echidnas are born survivors. Perfect Chaos might have wiped most of us out but we're still hanging on. That's the kinda attitude I'd expect from the youngest member of the Knuckles Clan."

Pleased with her father's praise (and not completely understanding what else he was talking about), Ruby clentched her fists and buried them into Knuckles' sturdy chest with the comical frown on her face that was often saved for when she was feeling extra tough.

"Knoockles!" she grunted in a funny deep voice which made her father laugh. Then she paused and rather than continue the 'beating' she was giving her father, began to carefully trace the outline of the white shape on Knuckles' chest.

"..._I see me moooon,_" she sang.

"That's the mark of the Guardian," Knuckles told her with a soft expression on his face, "At least I think it is. Either that or it's just a birth mark that's passed on. Pretty sure my father had that mark. And my father's father. And the father of my father's father. Or maybe the mother of my father's father's..." He stopped when he noticed that Ruby wasn't listening to him. "...Look, you have a 'moon' too. Sorta upside down though, eh?"

Ruby stroked her front, admiring her white marking and looking very pleased with herself.

"Can I be going gardan," she asked. Her voice was a little muffled from where she was looking down at herself.

"You want to go in the garden?"

"Go... Go be guarding."

"Gardening? You want to check on daddy's grape vines?"

"Guarding!"

"Guarding? Oh, you mean being the Guardian?" Knuckles hesitated and looked at his daughter proudly. "...Well... sure! If you want to take over from your Pop one day... But it takes years of training and, you know, you're very young. Not sure what your mother would think..." He looked out the window a tad wistfully before looking at Ruby's big round eyes, his voice slowly betraying a touch of sorrow. "And it's a full time job, too. You want to spend the rest of your life looking after the Master Emerald? You wouldn't want to... live your own life? Meet people and...and make friends?" His voice hitched. "...See the world?"

Images of his lonely youth trapped on Angel Island briefly passed through his memories. Waking up every day and patrolling the island before taking his position at the top of the shrine for the rest of the day, whether it was raining, snowing or storming, through the harshest winds, coldest temperatures, and blistering heats. Sometimes, when the clouds parted, Knuckles could spy the world down below, carrying on with their own lives which were full of variety. But he had simply learnt to cope with lonliness and even accept it, enjoy it even.

That was when life threw a curveball at him in the shape of a blue hedgehog.

"Ah, what am I saying?" Knuckles laughed, relieving Ruby who had just been starting to get worried, "If you end up growing up and making friends with the likes of any kid of Sonic's, you'll be dragged onto all kinds of crazy adventures, just like I was. Better get used to that. Hedgehogs are a right pain." He proudly smiled as his daughter hugged his huge hand and squeaked. "...Come on, then. Best go see the Old Girl."

Up the steps to the top of the shrine Knuckles carried her. Ruby had only been to see the Master Emerald a couple of times when she was young due to the fact that Knuckles didn't want the Master Emerald to bond with her too soon and choose her as the next Guardian before she'd had a chance to make her own decision. While she'd still been in the womb, Rouge had often remarked that it felt as though she was more in tune with the Master Emerald than she'd ever been before.

Knuckles felt the Master Emerald warm up a little as he appeared with the younger echidna before it.

"There you are, Ruby-Lei. The Master Emerald is happy to see you. Remember what I told you?" he asked, putting Ruby down at his feet.

"Mm-mm," Ruby nodded, holding onto her father's leg as though she had suddenly grown shy of the giant emerald. Then, in a quiet voice she began to address the mighty jewel. "Servers are seb-sebern chaos embalds. Chaos be power en..en... " (she'd always had a problem trying to pronounce this word) "en-itched by the heart." That was all she could remember for now.

In response, the Master Emerald glowed and Ruby beamed up at her father.

"...The Master Emerald likes you, Pug," Knuckles commented, patting Ruby's head.

"I love Master Embald." Her slight speech impediment, which everyone knew she'd probably grow out of, only made little Ruby's voice sound sweeter.

"Yeah..." Knuckles closed his eyes and inhaled slowly. "The Master Emerald has been singing. Can you feel it?" He stood there silently, his eyes closed as he breathed gently. Ruby watched him endearingly though she couldn't feel anything yet. She was still far too young. "...I'll bet it's just as excited as you are about the baby hedgehogs."

Ruby's eyes started to shine and she began to hop up and down in sudden excitement.

"Are they coming yet, Papa?" she asked eagerly, looking between Knuckles and the Master Emerald expectantly.

"Nearly, Ruby," Knuckles murmured, "Very nearly."

* * *

When the doors opened, creaking along the way, Orbot didn't immediately rush in and risk having his head removed from his shoulders as many an eager young bot had done before him. Edging in slowly, Orbot made sure to know his master's whereabouts before he fully entered the room. Dr Eggman was at his chest of drawers and staring at himself in the mirror.

"..._Good morning, Doctor Eggman_," Orbot greeted quietly, hovering by the exit should a quick getaway be needed. Eggman ignored him and a few minutes passed without either of them saying anything. "_Can I get you anything_?" Orbot tried asking and then, as Eggman's gaze turned to him in the reflection of the mirror, hurriedly added, "_Ah... Uh... By which I mean, anything to eat or drink? I'm not sure I can deliver any kind of, um, Freedom Fighter or any of the Resistance to_..." Eggman scoffed and turned away, kicking over his bin as he went. Another job for the robots to get round to doing. "..._you_."

Eggman disappeared into his en suite and didn't reappear until he was fully dressed in his usual red suit.

"_Any plans for the day, Sir_?" Orbot tried again.

This time Eggman did answer him. "I always have plans."

Orbot coughed awkwardly. "..._For the day, Sir_?"

Eggman sat down on his bed and bared his teeth at the red henchbot.

"Get out!"

Cubot almost found his partner plowing him down when he came hovering by his master's quarters. Taking a moment to compose himself after his dash from the room, Orbot cleared his mechanical throat.

"_I know I've said this before, Cubot_," he murmured, "_but I'm worried about Dr Eggman. I think he's... Well, I think he's losing the plot if you know what I mean_."

"_I hate it when that happens_," Cubot sighed, misinterpreting things, as usual, "_Just when you're getting into the book too_."

"_No_," Orbot groaned, "_I mean Dr Eggman might be... how to put it delicately... not firing on all four cylinders_." Cubot stared at him, still puzzled. Orbot rolled his eyes as, once again, he had to resort to spelling everything out for his dim-witted friend. "_He's going crazy_."

"_Oh_," Cubot nodded, "_Why didn't you just say that in the first place_?"

"Because I can hear the pair of you dolt-brains!" Orbot and Cubot jumped as Eggman's shape appeared behind them. "And of course I'm going crazy. It happens to all of us when we reach our time."

Cubot chuckled and made a poor show of trying to talk behind his hand to Orbot. "_Guess his clock is set a little earlier, huh_?"

"I can still hear you!" Eggman brought his hand down and slapped it smartly against the back of Cubot's head. It didn't do much in relieving the scientist of his pent up frustration and he slowly made his way to the kitchen with sagging shoulders. "Ah but what's the use in hiding it? The pile of Retirement Home Junk Mail just gets bigger and bigger."

"_It surely is remarkable how the mailman can seem to get here to deliver mail but no-one else can_," Orbot chirped up merrily as the two robots followed, adding today's delivery of Retirement Home advertisments to the pile.

"_Why would anyone else want to deliver mail?"_ Cubot mumbled, sifting through the pile with a little interest.

"_I was referring to the fact that the lair is cloaked and many miles out to sea. The military armies and the world leaders couldn't locate us but a humble fellow in powder blue shorts can get his letters all the way to our front door without any problem. Remarkable_."

"What is remarkable," Eggman spat, making himself a coffee, "is that I'm still no closer to finding that renegade of mine."

Orbot and Cubot exchanged looks. _"...You mean Metal Sonic?"_

Dr Eggman's darkening face confirmed the question. "He took off four years ago with Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll and now..."

"_It sometimes happens in families_," Cubot shrugged, "_Some kids just have no respect. They leave the nest without so much as a thank you or a goodbye. Where's the appreciation_?"

Eggman gave the yellow robot a withering look. "I sometimes wish _you'd _leave the nest."


	3. An Early Premonition

**Writer's Note - As readers of my previous story will know, OC's tend to irritate me. I have, however, included OC's in this story simply because they are needed to assist canon characters develop as the plot goes on.  
'Chaos Bond' does not revolve around OC's. The canon character's offspring were only created for my entertainment and have been included to help the story, not change it.  
****-Duma**

* * *

_Premonition - A strong feeling that something is about to happen, especially something unpleasant._

* * *

"Hold my hand," Silver warned, making a snatch for the toddler's waving arms, "I said _hold_..." Losing patience, Silver held out his other hand and caught the boy in a shimmer of blue psychokintetic energy. "There. Happy now?"

His 2 year old son, a strong-willed silver furred kitten, hung in mid-air with a look that suggested he was both enjoying being the air and feeling frustrated that he couldn't move. Wagging his purple-tipped tail, he began to wiggle about.

"Ah, ah, ah, no," Silver scolded, safely manouvering the child over the road and putting him safely down on the other side. "We're by a busy street so you're going to have to do as you're told and stay with me until we get to the park." He took the kitten's paw in his own again and felt the youngster pull. "Stop squirming, you! All right, all right, we're here now."

With a mew of delight, Steele, the son of Silver, scampered forward into the park and made a jump for the sandbox.

_So glad that kid is still in diapers_, Silver had thought to himself, not for the first time. He certainly didn't want to get an angry phone call from some park warden to complain that his son had been using the community sandbox as a litterbox instead. He'd grow out of it, Blaze had assured him.

In all honesty, Silver was amazed he even HAD a son. He and Blaze had narrowly avoided a royal scandal in the Sol Dimension when Blaze had discovered herself pregnant before she and Silver were due to wed but, sadly for the new parents, she had miscarried their first offspring.

Since the wedding, there were grave misgivings about the future of the Sol Throne for the doctors believed that the combination of Silver's psychokinesis and Blaze's pyrokinesis prevented a healthy embryo from growing. It was, therefore, a happy surprise when Blaze had given birth some time later to a healthy handsome prince with long silver fur.

Fur that would have to be washed clean of sand at this rate.

"Being a single parent is hard, huh?" a deeper voice commented and Silver jumped.

"Oh, Shadow... " Silver smiled awkwardly, "Ha, you come here often?"

Shadow looked around at the crowd of chattering parents and their small squealing broods. "Don't be an idiot. I know that's hard for you but please don't."

"Three glasses of whiskey for breakfast this morning, was it?"

"Well, you wouldn't know, Mr I'm-Anyone's-After-A-Cup-Of-Soda."

Silver gave a laugh and sat down on a bench to keep an eye on Steele. "I know you probably don't come down to the kid's park just to soak up the atmosphere so what's the matter? I mean, given that you _know_ I come here with Steele..."

"Yes, you should congratulate yourself; not everyone can say that I've taken the time to personally seek them out." Shadow flinched as a smiling rabbit apologetically dashed by him to retrieve her child from the top of the climbing frame.

"If I painted myself blue," Silver grinned, "I'm sure I'd be seeing you a lot more often."

"Oh Silver..." Shadow gripped his hands, reminding himself that there were children around. "You're just... just SO funny."

"That's your laughing face is it?"

"Silver..."

"Okay, okay." Silver held up his hands and departed from the 'banter'. "What did you need me for? Is it, perchance, anything to do with certain new-born arrivals which are due any day now?"

Shadow blinked at Silver. "What? Oh, that..." He coughed. "I'd completely forgotten about that."

"...No you didn't."

"You want to start a fight about it, Silver?" Shadow warned, leaning on the back of the bench, "Here? In front of your own son? I'd hate to do that to the boy."

"I'm not looking to fight you about anything, Shadow, I just wanted to see a little excitement."

Shadow watched as Steele shyly watched another little toddler play with his bucket and spade as though he was trying to muster up the courage to ask to have a go.

"...Are _you_ excited?"

"About Sonic's kids?" Silver smiled, his quills rustling as he turned his head, "Heck yeah!"

Shadow went very quiet and slowly sank onto the bench beside Silver. His face was unreadable.

"Come on, Shadow," Silver sighed, dropping his smile, "...I've never seen a baby hedgehog before. You know how _hard_ that is to think about?"

All around the playpark were children of a diverse population; cats, dogs, rabbits, squirrels, chipmunks, wolves, bears, birds, reptiles, horses, sheep...

"I, a hedgehog, have never seen the juvenile form of my own species. Of _course,_ I'm excited. It's something totally new to me."

"...What's so important about that?" Shadow shrugged.

"Well..." Silver shrugged, "I guess it's not so important for the average person but there weren't exactly hedgehogs running about the planet in the future during my old time. Even now with the new timeline in place there aren't ANY hedgehogs that live near me that I know. They certainly aren't having kids, that's for sure. I guess it just feels nice to see that you aren't part of an extinct species. I totally get how Knuckles felt when he found out that Rouge was having an echidna."

"Were you disappointed then," Shadow quietly said with a smirk, "that Blaze had a kitten?"

"What? Shadow, come on, man!"

"All right, fine. Sorry I said anything," Shadow shook his head and willingly decided to drop the subject about Sonic's impending fatherhood, "I'm actually here because, amazingly, you haven't been picking up your communicator calls recently."

"Been busy. And when I'm not busy, I'm back in my own time where, you know, it's hard to get a signal over the space-time continuum."

Blaze and Silver's arrangement for raising Steele was to have him spend equal amounts of time in Blaze's world, where he could benefit from the energy of the Sol Emeralds, and in Sonic's world, so he could spend time with children his own age and form strong bonds with the Allies' offspring. The future, Silver had firmly decided, wasn't fit to raise a prince like Steele. It was too turbulent and, above all, too lonely.

"Well, I'll cut to the chase," Shadow was saying, "GUN have been getting reports about some kind of spike in chaos energy over in the West. My team have been sent to scope it out."

"That's nice."

Shadow glanced at Silver. "...So, are you in?"

Silver turned away from where Steele had made friends with the other kid and blinked at Shadow in surprise. "What?"

"I'll have Rouge and Omega with me, of course, but I need..."

"...help?"

"A second opinion, actually," Shadow stopped himself from growling, "Trust me, if I DID need help, YOU wouldn't be the one I'd go to."

"Oof," Silver chuckled, "you sure know how to kick a man down, don't you?"

"I've been told I'm good at that, yes."

"So you need my opinion on, what, time travel? The power of the mind?"

"I'm pretty sure you heard me mention chaos energy."

Silver took a moment to comprehend the conversation, running it through in his mind over and over again.

"You..." He made sure to establish firm eye contact with Shadow. "You're coming to ME about chaos energy?"

"Knuckles is on Emerald Duty, Shade doesn't have much to do with chaos and Sonic..." Shadow rolled his eyes. "Well, he's currently a bit preoccupied with being a father-to-be. Won't wager much on his attention being fully on the mission. That leaves the only other hedgehog that's had direct contact with chaos energy which is you."

Silver nodded and turned his head away, a million different thoughts passing through his brain. Finally, coming to a decision, he stood and slowly approached the sandbox.

"...Hey, Steele?" he smiled down at his son, "You wanna go see Uncle Tails, Aunty Zooey and Rosemary?"

* * *

The Mystic Ruins was awash with summer greenery when Silver and Shadow arrived at the house which joined onto Tails Workshop. The noise of the waterfall was distant but the mist was still heavy enough in the air to create very pale rainbows among the clouds.

Down the front path and past the rows of brilliantly golden marigolds went Silver with Steele while Shadow shuffled half-heartedly behind them, more eager to be off and getting on with a mission than making house calls on a couple of foxes and their plant daughter.

After the doorbell rang a few times, the front door opened and there stood Zooey the Fox having recently dried herself after a bath from the looks of her fluffed fur. She was dressed in a pair of jeans and a red top and had a gentle smile on her face which was specially reserved for any friend of her partner.

"Silver and Steele!" she beamed, "What a nice surprise..." Then she caught sight of the darker hedgehog standing behind who ackowledged Zooey with a nod. "Shadow too? Did you need Tails for something?"

"Uh, no," Silver told her and held Steele's paw tighter as the kitten tried to pull his father into the house, "Hopefully not, anyway. I've just been asked to help out with a mission for Team Dark and, well, I was wondering if you'd be okay to just watch Steele for a few hours..."

Zooey had noticed Steele's impatience to go and fish out the toys that Zooey had collected should honourary nephews or neices come visiting. "Of course it's fine! Rosemary! Rosemary, you've got a visitor!" she called into the house.

_PIT, PAT, PIT, PAT, TUMP-TUMP-TUMP-TUMP, PIT PAT, PIT, PAT_ came the sound of delicate feet on the upstairs landing and then down the stairs and then across the house. Sliding into view on the polished wooden floor came 6 year old Rosemary-Foxglove, looking more grown-up than ever.

"Has Uncle Sonic and Aunty Amy's babies come!?" she immediately asked, her blue eyes shining. Silver had to bite back a smile.

"No, sweetheart," Zooey chuckled and stepped to one side. "It's Steele."

"Hi Steele!" Rosemary's brief moment of disappointment soon vanished. She loved her younger 'cousins' and demonstrating this she came over and took Steele by the hand, "Come see what I'm doing." So Steele obediantly trotted in behind Rosemary, waving his free hand behind him as he bade farewell to his father without looking back. As the pair of them vanished from view, they could hear Rosemary still chatting to him. "..It's big girl stuff so you won't understand because you're only little but I can show you... Are you excited for the new babies? _I_ am. My daddy says I get to hold one when they get born..."

Silver shook his head. "Sonic and Amy must be feeling the pressure from these kids to get on with things."

"It's the first time that Rosemary has been old enough to get properly excited about a new baby," Zooey shrugged, "Don't think Steele is anywhere near as excited but he's being polite about it. Bless him. Anyway, it's not a problem. Cream is coming over at some point to do some gardening with Rosemary and I'm sure we'll manage. I'll keep him for as long as you need me too. The pair of you better take care though."

"Thanks, Zooey," Silver said, "And tell Tails I say hello."

Tails was walking through the back door which lead into his workshop when Zooey came through from the hallway.

"Was that Silver I heard at the door?" Tails asked, peeling off his oil stained gloves to throw in the wash.

"Yes," Zooey nodded, "Shadow too."

"Silver AND Shadow?" Tails murmured, looking a trifle worried, "What did they need?"

"Silver was just dropping off Steele." Zooey pointed into the dining room where Rosemary had an assortment of papers and pencils and toys spread out. The kitten was sat next to her with a fat blue crayon in his paws that Rosemary had given him for his own piece. "He's helping Team Dark with something from what I can gather."

Tails gnawed his bottom lip. "...Did they say what?"

"No." Zooey glanced at Tails with a frown. "Why?"

Her fiance (for Tails and Zooey had been engaged for about a year), leant against the wall and tried wiping at the dark oil stains on his fur.

"This morning my computer detected abnormal chaos energy readings somewhere to the West, beyond Westopolis," he explained, "Just thought it was a coincidence."

Zooey didn't like the sound of that. "...What do you mean by 'abnormal'?" After all, the world was full of chaos energy. It was the very stuff the Mobians breathed alongside oxygen. It ran through all of them, with some people more affected than others.

"Sudden spikings," Tails told her, "Areas where highly concentrated amounts of chaos energy are, well, 'errupting', for want of an easier word."

"So like little flares of chaos?"

"Yeah, kinda like that." Tails straightened up again and gave a small smile. "I guess Shadow, Rouge and Omega have been sent to check things out."

"Well," Zooey sighed, "here's hoping it's just some underground energy veins that have broken through the surface."

* * *

The hoglets were due that summer and in the meantime, Amy Rose had been advised to take slow strolls every once in a while to help things along. "_It'll be a nice quiet time for you and your husband_," the doctor had said. "_I went on walks with my partner just before the baby was due_," said the lady waiting in line at the pharmacy. "_A nice amble stroll through the park is so romantic_," the midwife had gushed.

Yeah, well, none of them were married to Sonic the Hedgehog.

To be fair to him, Amy had thought, he did make the effort to slowly walk beside his heavily pregnant wife for most of the way and he only went to sprint off around the country a couple of times which didn't take him very long. He surprised Amy by keeping pace with her this time and trying not to imitate her slight waddle as they turned for home.

"You getting tired, Ames?" he then asked, noticing her expression change. She was leaning on his arm and he felt the increase of weight as she leant more heavily on him.

"A little," she admitted, "My back is aching and my ankles are really hurting." She was more than ready for the hoglets to be born.

Seeing as baby hedgehogs were extraordinarily small at birth, Amy wasn't as big as you might expect a human to look carrying more than one child but it didn't mean that it didn't wear her out just as much.

"See," Sonic tutted, "told you we should have taken the short path."

"Yes, okay, I know," Amy moaned, "I'll be fine."

Sonic then stopped walking. "That's right you will - come here."

"What are you-?" Amy began to ask and then shrieked as the blue hedgehog bent down and carefully lifted Amy off her feet and slowly leant her back in his arms, carrying her bridal style. "SONIC!" she screeched, "Sonic, put me down! This is embarassing!"

"There's no-one around for you to get embarassed in front of," Sonic laughed, beginning to walk along the path again.

"Look, I'm too heavy," Amy went on complaining, "Put me down!"

"Heavy? Nonsense. I'm just skilled enough to carry my wife and children all at the same time. Those spats with Knuckles really pay off."

"You're not exactly affording me any dignity here, _darling_."

"Dignity, shmignity. I've always carried you this way. I thought you liked it." Sonic smirked at her with his eyes half-liddded, in an attempt to look flirty. "You used to put your arms around my neck and gush about how brave and handsome and heroic I was."

"I still do, you silly," Amy sighed, folding her arms and surrendering to the situation, "But the doctor said _I'm_ meant to do the gentle strolling. Nature isn't going to care if the father does some gentle strolling too."

"What if I do some running?"

"Not with us in your arms you're not!"

"No," Sonic's flirt face was back on again, "I mean you could stand in the middle and watch me do all that _exhilirating_ running around that seemed to get your spikes in a spin and perhaps the excitement will cause-"

"Don't talk like that in front of the children!" Amy gasped, her face heating up, "They can hear us you know!"

"Bah, they won't know what I'm talking about." Sonic looked down at Amy's tummy warningly, "But just in case you do, you'll have to wait until your older before we have THAT talk."

"Sonic, stop it!" Amy laughed but by that time, Sonic had carried Amy all the way back to their cottage. Or Amy's cottage, really, seeing as Sonic was still a nomad traveller by nature. Not that he hadn't been sticking around the past couple of months in the event that the children he'd fathered would arrive...

"Here we are," Sonic announced, using his very talented feet to open the door once Amy had leant across and unlocked it. Navigating the porch and the hallway table and finding a safe route to the front room, Sonic managed to lower Amy into the cushions on the sofa. "Now, my lady," he told her, taking her jacket, "you stay there and I'll bring your slippers and a drink."

"Yes, Husband," Amy chuckled, kicking off her shoes and reaching for the remote.

Sonic wasn't so fussy with Amy usually but, whether he could pick up on something or not, he seemed extra attentive to her needs. It was usually the mother that 'nested' in her final stages before the birth but Amy had never known someone to 'nest' as much as Sonic seemed to. She personally believed that it was his fear and excitement mixed with his 'out of this world' levels of chaos energy that was making him alert and sensitive.

In truth, Amy was partly glad for this; she liked being the more laid back one. She could afford to be too, because she was absolute sure that it was because of Sonic's Chaos biology that had meant that she'd had a relatively easy pregnancy. Besides the back pain and ankles.

Turning on the TV, Amy was confronted with a talk show: _Late Night Sit Down with Jimmy Falcon_. Not usually what she'd traditionally watch but his opening pitch seemed to interest her:

_"-there still robots running loose? This is the big question we're asking here today and it seems that, if our recent audience poll is anything to go by, a lot of people are saying 'yes'. Joining me on the show this evening, let me please welcome, Candy the Mouse, internet Vlogger sensation, and Alex Kid who I am sure many viewers will recognise as-"_

She supposed it was better than watching that cooking programme with Gordon the Ram, or wincing at _Jerry Springbok_.

"Sweetie," she called over her shoulder, "did the mail come today?"

"It's in the hallway. I'll bring it."

"-_want to thank you both for being here. Now regarding the audience poll, we're getting plenty of the same arguments which are that just because Eggman isn't taking center stage, it doesn't mean his robots are out of the picture. Candy, I know you mentioned something like this on your recent vlog-?"_

"One pair of snuggle slippers, one washed and fluffed robe, one healthy drink and three letters delivered fresh today," Sonic announced as he came into the room.

"Thank you," Amy smiled, "and I'll expect you'll want a tip?" Lifting her face she kissed him on the cheek.

"What do you want to do for food tonight?" Sonic then asked.

Amy wrinkled her nose. "I don't know. I don't feel like cooking, to be honest."

"Never fear," Sonic grinned, "I'll whip us up something."

"And by something, you mean chili dogs."

"Hey, no, I can do... an omelette!"

He never failed in making Amy laugh. "An omelette sounds delicious."

'Candy the Mouse' was still chatting away on the television screen:

"_-oint remains that I wouldn't trust Dr Eggman not to make more robots. I mean, when you reach that stage in life, what else have you got except your hobbies? I don't even think Eggman knows how NOT to make robots. So then you have to ask, where does he keep them all?"_

"World getting paranoid?" Sonic murmured with a half-hearted chuckle.

"They always do," Amy sighed, leaning back and balancing her mug on her tummy as Jimmy Falcon began to talk again.

"_-ports on robot sightings have doubled over the course of a year but the government has yet to make an official statement regarding the people's fears. Now, Alex, you mentioned in your article that you believe that there may be reason behind this?" _

_"Yes, well, the short answer is that they're keeping quiet about this because, as is usually the case, they're scared about the result or... sorry, the _response_ from the population if they're told that they aren't as secure or as safe as the higher ups would have them believe. But, you know, to give them the benefit of the doubt, there is the possibility that we ARE perfectly safe and that they have FULL control of the situation and these robot sightings are just nuisences to them." _

_"Yes, and with some of the Sonic Allies working for the G.U.N. we can be assured that there will not be any Eggman robot spared. But that seems to do little to comfort the likes of one viewer who had this to say-"_

Amy idly flicked through her post as more chatter continued on the TV. It wasn't until that whoever they were talking to suddenly started to get a little more aggressive that she looked up in curiosity.

"_-means there are double the chances of encountering one! Do the math, people! Why would there be an increase in this if not because of the fact that Eggman is making more robots than he can handle? Besides this, and I hate to bring it up, but we have had absolutely NO news regarding Metal Sonic which, as has been agreed, is one of Eggman's more dangerous robots. The last we heard of it was from four years ago when the official statement came and now nothing and, as a nation, we have a RIGHT to know if we should be anticipating another appearance from it again or if we're allowed to relax. And, I'm sorry, but the very fact that it's now public news that Sonic the Hedgehog is due to be a father can only spark further interest from the likes of Dr Eggman and ESPECIALLY Metal Son-"_

The television was abruptly switched off.

Dropping the remote control back down on the sofa, Sonic shot Amy a strained smile. "Well, we don't need that now, do we?"

She hadn't really thought about it before.

About what Eggman and his minions would think about Sonic's lineage passing on.

About what Metal Sonic would think...and do.

* * *

After Amy had settled for an afternoon nap after lunch, Sonic quietly slipped out of the house and went for a quick sprint over the fields and didn't stop until he'd reached the coast, startling several gulls that went flying off into the air, squalling and screeching angrily.

Taking a large gulp of air, Sonic braced himself.

"..._Okay, Metal. Don't think I haven't felt you trying to tug away at the back of my head for the past four years. What do you want_?"

For a moment, he didn't think he'd get a response. It had been a while since he'd last seen Metal Sonic at the destruction of Christmas Isle and he'd done his level best to block the robot from his head since then. But, to his surprise, after a few minutes of silence, a voice began to talk to him from inside his thoughts.

"..._**Nothing you can provide in your living state**_."

"_So you don't want a cup of sugar_?" Sonic smiled, albiet cautiously, "_Movie recommendations? Fashion tips_?"

There was still something about Metal Sonic that scared Sonic, not that the hedgehog would ever admit that and talking to him wasn't his favourite thing to do. That didn't mean, however, that he was going to stop his old joking ways.

"_**Sonic**_..."

No, for as long as he could outrun an enemy and trusted in himself, he'd never give his respect easily. Least of all to Metal Sonic...

"_Run an errand for you_?" he went on teasing, "_Need more coffee? Just wanted to say 'hi'?"_

"_**You've been shutting me out for all this time**_," Metal Sonic growled in his head, "_**And only NOW have you allowed me to establish a connection. So, really, it should be ME asking the questions, not you. You're the one wanting to talk.**_"

Sonic laughed out at the sea. "_I guess having an analytical computer brain has its perks. Of course, it makes you a real buzzkill_..."

"_**You're too far away for me to mentally hurt, Sonic, but that does not mean I will not try**_."

Sonic's smile wavered.

"..._Yeah_..." he muttered, "_I believe you_."

The ocean waves shooshed the cliffs, the taste of salt beginning to settle on Sonic's lips. He watched the horizon and tried to use his connection to Metal Sonic to guess where the robot might be. But they were too far away from one another and Metal was keeping himself secret so the only thing to do was to cut to the chase.

"..._Where are you, then? You and your... Well, do you call them friends_?"

"_**If I were the one asking, you wouldn't be in a hurry to divulge your location. Why should I be any different. We are, after all, practically twins**_..."

"_You wish_," Sonic hissed, "_You're not even half the hedgehog I am_."

There was no word from Metal.

"..._Look, this thing between us_..." Sonic began, his smile utterly depleted, "_It's JUST between you and me_."

He thought he could _feel_ Metal Sonic tilt his head in curiosity.

"_**Why such a statement, Sonic?"**_

"_Because whatever it is you're planning, it doesn't involve anyone else. It's our fight, our war_."

"_**On the contrary my **_**friends**_** have insisted on supporting me. Our fight may be between us but that says nothing for THEIR fights**_."

Sonic cursed. He'd almost forgotten about Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll. But Tails and Knuckles were seasoned fighters and had been capable of defending themselves for years. Amy was another matter and all Sonic wanted was some confirmation that Metal wouldn't target her or her unborn hoglets.

"..._So Tails and Knuckles are going to face trouble_," Sonic nodded with reluctant acceptance, "_But no-one else. That's it. Three of you and three of us. Just like old times. Remember_?"

"_**You mean to say you won't call on any of your other friends to help you?"**_

_"No. If it's between your team and my team, then that's how it's going to stay."_

"_**You seem very adamant in this**_." Metal's voice could be mistaken as playful if he had any idea on how to voice emotion. "_**Any reason as to why you've given these specific demands**_?"

"_Last time we saw each other, everyone was involved. People got hurt_." Sonic immediately thought of Rouge who had been expecting Ruby at the time. He remembered the very real fear that Knuckles' unborn daughter was miscarried. "_We're not repeating that_."

He waited as Metal Sonic toyed with him.

"..._**I will have to consider it. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm due to make a social call on someone**_."

Alarm bells rining in his ears, Sonic's quills tightened. "_On who_?"

But Metal Sonic had disconnected now.

"_Metal! On WHO_?"


	4. Seeking and Finding

The old factory had been rebuilt a dozen times but it was still in shambles no matter how functional it was. When Metal Knuckles clipped the remains of a saw-weilding badnik carcass, he gave a growl of annoyance.

Metallic Madness Zone was one of Metal Sonic's favourite places to be but when it looked like this, it wasn't exactly an award-winning location and most of that was due to the fact that it had been built from the oringal remains which had been transported to the main planet. It wasn't a zone on Little Planet anymore. It had got to the point where Eggman (Robotnik at the time) had simply given up on repairing all the damage and repainting every scratch when he knew that the likes of Sonic, Tails, Knuckles or even Amy Rose would be along to wreck the place.

Sparking wires hung from the ceiling and the sharp edges of blades and saws were strewn along walkways and protruding from walls. A few badniks which were still barely online and hadn't the power to move could only watch as Metal Knuckles, following the Tails Doll, passed by them without so much as backwards glance. Cages which were broken and bent out of shape were stuffed to the side and the old lasers and weapons were rusted and clogged with dust. The original zone on Little Planet must have looked a lot more impressive in comparisson to the rebuilt zone on Mobius.

**"How can such simple-minded organics cause such a mess**?" Metal Knuckles asked, mostly to himself.

"**Inconsiderate-ate**," Tails Doll answered and then began to giggle maniacly. "**Eye for an eye for an eye for an eye**!" he sang, hovering over the ground with his head flopped to one side. He may have had robot circuitry inside him but his plush-like outer form was soft and didn't have the strength to support the processor in his head.

"**In time, my friend, yes**," Metal Knuckles told him in a dark tone, "**You and I will pay back our Inferiors when we are ready**."

"**But not just for R-R-Robotniiiik/."**

"**No. Metal Sonic broke us from our code. We are free to proceed as we want**."

Tails Doll flicked his antennae side to side as he floated along, sometimes stretching out his arm horizontally to slide it along the surface of the wall nearest him. As he was doing this, he twisted his neck 180 degrees to look back at Metal Knuckles.

"**You feel... anger**?" he asked. The Tails Doll was a support unit with the ability to recharge and take care of his larger, stronger metal brothers. He also had the capability to sense what sort of mental condition thye were in.

"**For the Eggman? No**," Metal Knuckles replied, "**For my Inferior? ... Yes**."

"**Wasn't fair**..." Tails Doll whispered, turning his head back with a sickening _cl-ACK_, "**They get free life. What do we have...? So/ s-selfish."**

"**Organics always are**," said Metal Knuckles, **"But fret not, we will be avenged**."

Tails Doll lead Metal Knuckles through the factory, climbing and sliding down through the maze of pathways. "**W-W-Weeee/ must wait for Metal Sonic-ic to complete his investi-ti-gation**."

"**I am sure he will not be long about it**." Metal Knuckles' green optics shimmered in a brief burst of excitement. "**He was created to keep pace with his Inferior. Hedgehogs are not known for slow feet. Speaking of, Tails Doll, if you would**...?"

The red antennae began to glow a little brighter and Tails Doll surged forward. "**Finding. Finding. Finding**."

In one of the larger chambers sat a huge pile of twisted metal debris, the victim of a brutal assault from a hedgehog, a fox and an echidna. It's form was scarred and blackened from where its systems had burnt and exploded, leaving behind a dead husk... and several capsules all around.

"**Found! Found! F-F-ooound/!" **Tails Doll chirped, flying over and examining the capsules one by one.

Metal Knuckles look at them with a cold hard stare. "**Is there not one that hasn't sustained damage**?"

Tails Doll flitted from one to another, checking it over, discarding it if it wasn't good and moving on to the next. Finally, he stopped at one capsule and his antennae flashed in triumph.

**"...This one good. This one perfect**."

Metal Knuckles came over and glowered down at teh dusty capsule.

"**Show me**," he ordered.

So Tails Doll opened the capsule to reveal the occupant inside.

Metal Knuckles nodded. approvingly. "**It still functions. Excellent work. Metal Sonic WILL be pleased**."

* * *

They'd arrived an hour ago but it wasn't until they'd really searched the area that Team Dark and their additional member stumbled across a plausable site for their sudden energy readings.

"It's an excavation site," Shadow had announced, looking down into a large gorge where old buildings could be seen in the rocky faces of the walls, as though they had been sunk into the ground over the course of however many years.

Whatever work had gone on here, it had been abandoned before completion, from the looks of things. Traces of archelogist tools, such as a bit of brush and the odd page from a notebook, had been carelessly left behind which could only suggest that the people working here had left in a hurry.

Rouge caught a breeze and glided into the gorge, sweeping the area and landing with a gentle flap of her wings. Silver landed somewhere behind her, looking around in absolute amazement, no doubt wondering what sort of state these very ruins would be in back in his own time. The bat, an expert in this environment, took another study of the space around her and prodded the toe of her steel-capped boots into the ground.

"Probably an energy vein running through here," she murmured, "A likely reason why the archeologists left."

No-one tampered with the planet's energy veins, especially since the Dark Gaia incident many years ago. But if the flares were anything to look into, there had obviously been a breach of some sort.

As Shadow inspected the walls, Rouge picked up a stray piece of notepaper. The writing was barely readable and most of it was erased anyway but there were some words that the bat was able to pick out.

"Hey that's... 'The Fourth Great Civilisation'..." she said to herself and then stared up at the ruins embedded into the rock. She took in the unique style of stonework and the faint glyphs that had been scratched out around it. "This is echidna arcitecture." She recognised the similiar style of art from various ruins and buildings around the Mystic Ruins and on Angel Island. Knuckles had overseen the structure of the new Emerald Shrine over their house and the carvings were very similar.

"Guess these people were trying to dig up baby photos of either Knuckles or Shade," Silver joked, taking a step in Shadow's direction. Shadow was just emerging from one of the large doorways having briefly taken a look inside.

"**Scans indicate high levels of energy coming from these ruins**," Omega told them, turning around with a blue light flashing on his chest.

"What were they used for?" asked Silver, appearing next to Shadow. "I mean, we're nowhere near the Mystic Ruins and I figured that's where Knuckles' clan used to live before Angel Island, you know, actually became Angel Island."

"Shade's clan," Shadow answered in a quiet voice. "'The Fourth Great Civilisation'. They focused on science and technology but they still retained their old beliefs."

Rouge appeared on Shadow's other side. "Mmm. Definitely looks more 'Nocturnus' style," she agreed, deciding she was the leading expert on echidnas now that she had married one and mothered another.

"Let's just find out the cause of these chaos energy readings," Shadow sighed, turning towards the next ruin.

For half an hour, the team of four went from ruin to ruin, recording on readings and looking for signs of tampering but they couldn't work out where the energy was coming from. Whenever it seemed as though they were getting close, the readings would wobble and move. Eventually, it got to the point where Shadow felt suspicious.

"...Are you picking up anything?" Shadow discretely whispered to Silver as Omega lead the way into yet another temple.

Silver had grown very quiet in the past ten minutes and he shuffled uncomfortably from foot to foot.

"...I'm picking up an uneasy feeling in my quills but nothing that reminds me of chaos energy," Silver admitted.

It had been a while since he'd last used Chaos Energy since he had to put in more of an effort to absorb it, unlike Sonic and Shadow who attracted Chaos Energy much more easily, but he would never forget the feeling it gave him as it ran through his veins. It was like being plugged into a power source which could have powered you for centuries - and probably would! It wasn't a feeling you let go of in a hurry.

Shadow's face darkened. "...Same."

"Fellas," Rouge called from the back of the room.

The ruin they had entered was one of the largest and the one that seemed in best condition. Figures carved out of stone decorated the walls and the collumns that were still standing were ornate and beautiful. It was likely an old place of worship or perhaps somewhere where echidnas could come and speak with their clan's spiritual elders, otherwise known as _Mitres_. Shade's _Mitre_ had been Imperiator Ix.

"**Energy readings are at peak percentage**," Omega said, updating them all.

Shadow came up to where Rouge was pointing at a small alter-like table where a small buzzing piece of equipment, which stood out in contrast with the surroundings, could be seen flashing occassionally. "So this is our source."

"**Device recognised as an Energy Generator**," Omega informed them, "**Identity label confirmed: Eggman Industries**."

"Doctor Eggman wanted us to come all this way," Rouge scoffed and rolled her eyes. "Inconsiderate fool."

"I believe he was hoping Sonic would come," said Shadow, stating the obvious.

"We're springing a trap for Sonic, are we?" Rouge looked around her and laughed. "Big Blue owes us for this one."

"...So where's Eggman?" Silver asked, noticing that both he and Shadow were having trouble keeping their quills from rising into a defensive position.

Before he could question why they both felt uncomfortable, Omega suddenly began to bleep out a warning.

"**Alert! I'm picking up seismic readings in the earth. Quake iminent**!"

Seconds later, the ground shuddered like jelly underneath their feet and they all struggled to keep their balance as a dust littered down on them from above. Several small rocks fell down a short distance away and a large crack split through one of the pillars near the entrance but, other than that, once the shaking stopped, there wasn't any other apparent damage.

"What on Mobius was that!?" Rouge coughed and spluttered, wafting the dust from her face.

Silver shook his spiny head and rubbed his nose. "Please don't be an underground snake monster..."

Shadow's voice beside him did nothing to encourage him. "It isn't..."

That was when the ceiling gave way and the team had only a second to look up with gaping mouths as several tons of rock and earth came cascading down on top of them.

An outside observer might have been right to say that they were buried but, if they'd looked just a little later, they would have noticed that some of the rocks were giving off a pale blue glow. Underneath these rocks was a white grey hedgehog with his arms outstretched and a huge grimace on his face as he kept the cave-in from completely burying his friends. Omega only got dinged a little bit on his arm but he barely noticed that.

"Don't worry," Silver tried to smile, not letting his arms wobble, "I got it."

To answer him, a second load of rock came thundering down and Silver only just caught it in time with his power, earning another wince on his face.

He gave a grunt and straightened up, wrinkling his nose and forehead in concentration. "...Still got it."

When the_ third _load rained down, Silver's arms did shake a bit and his ears flattened against his head.

"Okay..." he squeaked, "Starting to... It's starting to get a bit, um... Yeah... "

"Hang in there Silver. I'll dig us out," Rouge told him, scrabbling away at the rocks with her claws and feet. "You boys going to help?"

Shadow, after getting a nod from Silver that he was okay, nodded back to her. "Just be careful, Rouge. I know who did this and he's more than likely still around."

Rouge detected the apprehension in Shadow's voice. "Who did it?"

Omega let out a noise which could easily have been mistaken for a growl; he could sense who it was.

"Gah!" Silver suddenly cried, stumbling a bit and closing his eyes as he tried to keep the rocks off everyone. There wasn't any room for him to dump it all aside so he had to stay where he was. "This is... kinda giving me a headache... "

Rouge dug faster. "We're on it, hun."

Rouge was the first out of the pile, followed by Omega. Just as Shadow was climbing from the rocks, a sharp _smack_ was heard as a flash of blue appeared from the darkness and slammed into Omega, carrying them both forward into the gorge and out of what was left of the ruins.

From there, a short sharp burst of laser fire was enough to short-circuit Omega and leave him in the dirt, sparking and whining.

"Omega!" Shadow thundered, rocketing out into the open and spin-dashing their attacker. But he was met with nothing but air as the assailant moved out of harm's way. Shadow whipped his head round with his pointed teeth bared in a hiss.

Red organic eyes met red robot optics.

Metal Sonic hissed back.

"You piece of junk!" Rouge shouted and then gasped as yet another cave-in began. She had barely enough time to flit out of the way before another small avalanche added itself to the tomb already forming around Silver.

"Please tell me you lot are clear!" came Silver's very muffled voice from inside the pile. "I can't hold much more of this and I don't want to bury you!"

Rouge tried shouting back that they were fine but she had to make another dodge as Metal Sonic took a shot at her. Shadow instantly retaliated by charging at Metal with his quills brandished out in front of him, hitting his mark and throwing the enemy through the air away from Rouge and Silver. Metal Sonic fizzed angrily and extended his claws, blocking Shadow as the darker hedgehog came in for another shot. It was a short-lived victory as Metal Sonic found himself under assault from a barrage of laser fire.

"**Attacking a superior robot**?" Omega snapped, "**Shame on you**."

Now with both Shadow and Omega on his back, Metal Sonic was forced into a defensive position.

"REALLY starting to hurt now, guys!" Silver was calling again. His arms were aching but that was nothing compared to the agony in his head as he tried to keep an intense amount of weight off himself with nothing but his mind. If he kept it up too long, he could be in for one gruesome nosebleed. "Guys?"

"Omega, Shadow!" Rouge shouted over her shoulder, pulling at the rock pile, "Keep him off me! I'm getting Silver out of there."

Omega let of another round at the enemy but Metal Sonic avoided the gunfire, flying forward and grabbed the larger mech's arms. Shadow used the window of oppurtunity to throw himself at him again and following it with a Chaos Spear. Both attacks landed and Metal shuddered as his circuits sparked. Shadow had little compassion for the likes of Metal Sonic nowadays and didn't let a second pass before he was on the offense again. Metal had to fire all his thrusters to avoid another hit and then call upon his agility to dodge the attacks from Omega.

Rouge went on pulling at the rocks.

Metal Sonic continued to dodge and scratch at Shadow when he came close and eventually infuriated him enough to shoot another Chaos Spear which, with timing on Metal's part, shook the wall of the gorge and caused the whole face to collapse down on top of them, slowing down the attack and giving Metal Sonic a moment to turn his attention to what Rouge was doing on the other side of the gorge.

Having recovered from his assault, Metal Sonic narrowed his eyes and shot forward towards her.

"Rouge!" Shadow called, pulling himself from the debris, "Incoming!"

The bat growled as she turned, already sending out a kick just in time to catch Metal off guard and repel him away from her but she was quick to lunge forwards after him, grabbing Metal by the arm and swinging him round in an arc to smash him against the ground.

Metal Sonic lifted his feet and kicked her off just as Shadow and Omega came on the attack again. However, it was anger that now fuelled Metal Sonic and he weaved around their attacks with infuriating skill. Omega activated his guns and unleashed a barrel-load of pellets at Metal which went pattering against him and against the wall he was blown towards as a result.

What was left of the ruin now collapsed down on top of Silver and he let out a cry of pain.

"One...One more of those and I'm...and I won't..." His little voice couldn't be heard by any of Team Dark. But it was heard by Metal Sonic.

The robot fired his thrusters once more and, flying forward, grabbed Shadow by surprise. Lifting the Ultimate Lifeform up into the air, he swung round and used the momentum to shoot Shadow down at Rouge with enough force to stun both. Then it was another well-aimed shot to Omega's back before he then played his trump card by pulling out the white Chaos Emerald and, using it's power, shot a powerful blast down at all three members of Team Dark. The ground trembled one last time and the entire gorge began to crumble as the wall's integrity failed to stand up to the punishment.

It gave Metal time to turn his attention to the only one who he hadn't had the pleasure of battling today.

Silver turned his head, his fur dampening with the exertion he was putting on himself to keep the rocks from crushing him. He couldn't work out where any of the others were so he didn't dare risk tossing the debris away but he was considering it when he saw that the one peering in through the rock at him was Metal Sonic.

"...Uh... "

The last thing he recalled were sharp claws flying towards him.

Omega had run to retrieve Silver but the force of the avalanche of rock threw him aside. Looking up, Shadow caught sight of Metal Sonic with Silver dangling from his hand, flying over the destruction. Shadow had little choice but to use Chaos Control to get his team out of there! His knees buckled as he pulled himself from the gorge and Rouge fell from his grip onto the grass as they teleported to safety but a cry from her brought him to his senses.

"Silver!"

Team Dark looked up in time to see Metal Sonic vanish with a Chaos Emerald in one hand and an unconscious Silver the Hedgehog in the other.


	5. We Lost Silver

First there was a polite, _knock knock knock_. Then, not a second later, _thump thump BANG BANG BANG_ on the front door. The movie had to be paused as Amy looked round fearfully and Sonic immediately tightened his back muscles.

"Wha-? Who's that?" Amy cried, hugging one of her throw pillows.

"Stay here, Ames," Sonic told her, getting to his feet, "I'll go see."

Opening the front door, Sonic almost jumped to find a badly bruised Team Dark crowding Amy's doorstep. Omega was stood at the back, robotic expression giving nothing away while Rouge, who had knocked first, had been moved to one side. Up in front, and no doubt the one responsible for the more aggressive knocking, was Shadow wearing an expression that promised a swift end to anyone who hindered him.

Sonic opened his mouth to voice his surprise. "Sha-?"

"We've lost Silver."

Sonic closed his mouth again. Shadow wasn't one to joke around or to jump to conclusions like that without reason. The two hedgehogs gazed into one another's eyes a few seconds before the blue speedster opened the door wider and let the team in.

Amy was on edge when Sonic returned, accompanied by Shadow, Rouge, and Omega who had made sure to close the door after him, being a considerate robot.

"... I'm calling Tails," Sonic flatly stated, heading to the phone.

"What's happened?" Amy asked calmly, knowing full well that panicking wasn't going to help her.

Shadow was watching Sonic make a phone call but he spared Amy a quick, considerate glance. "Metal Sonic took Silver."

* * *

Tails came over immediately within the half hour and began to debrief each member of Team Dark which eventually turned into a conversation that went something along the lines of this:

"You're telling me that Metal set a trap to _specifically _catch Silver?" Tails said rhetorically, talking to himself mostly, "You sure he wasn't hoping for Sonic and just made do with Silver instead?"

"I don't get it," Amy said, "Was Silver the actual target?"

"He seemed to be," nodded Rouge, "from what I could see."

"Then why..." Tails wagged his tail in aggitation and held his chin, "Surely Metal would know that Shadow would have been more likely to go to Sonic about joining you guys on the mission."

"But instead Metal was counting on Shadow bringing _Silver_," Amy murmured.

"How do you make a trap specific enough to target one person? Something as broad as an energy spike could be an open invitation to anyone."

"Basically, what we've gathered is that Metal _knew _Sonic wasn't going to show up. Is that it?"

"It's just the question of _HOW _would Metal know?" Tails sighed. His back and forth with Amy wasn't giving him anything satisfactory but no-one else besides Rouge seemed to be making an effort to chip into the conversation.

"They have that mental link, don't they?" Rouge said, nodding her head towards Sonic who had leant himself against the wall.

"The mental link has to be two-way in order to work," Tails told her, "and Sonic's been blocking Metal for years. There's no way Metal could have used it."

"Let's stop wasting time on trying to theroise Metal's trap-making techinques and instead focus on the fact that Silver's gone," Sonic then said quietly.

Rouge sighed and rolled her bruised shoulder. "I better head back to Angel Island," she said, "I can get Knuckles to contact Blaze through the Master Emerald."

Shadow looked up sharply. "We're sure that's a good idea?"

"Ha! You want to NOT tell her what's happened?" said Sonic, "Besides, Steele will be wanting a parent before long and I don't want to be the one to kneel down at tell him that his dad's been kidnapped by a deranged robot."

"You better come over to my place," Tails said, "We're looking after Steele at the moment. Blaze will want to go there."

"Good idea," Amy answered, already heading off to get her coat.

* * *

It was draughty when Silver began to regain consciousness. Draughty and drippy. And dark, very dark. It took him a few seconds to adjust to the low level of light, but rather than occupy himself with trying to work out where he was, he could only focus on the thumping headache in his temples.

"Hnngh? Wh-Where-? Ow, my head," he could hear himself mutter as his hearing came back to him. He blinked his golden eyes several times and first took note of the cables and wires all over the floor and the sound of the wind somehwere in the distance. There was a medium sized television screen set up to his left but it wasn't showing anything but a black background and single flashing green text cursor.

Then he realised he couldn't move. His hands and arms were tied to the chair he had woken up in and that was the same for his feet and legs. His lower torso was also secured so the only part of him that he could pull from the chair was his upper body and that didn't really do anything at the moment.

"What in the...?" He flinched again as something dripped onto his shoulder. It turned out to be a small droplet of blood which shone in brilliant contrast to his powdery pale fur. He had clearly sustained an injury somewhere on his head if he was bleeding but he didn't pay any mind to it as he chose to instead look around at the bizarre rounded tunnel.

"Oookay...Uh, hello?" He then stopped as images of the ruins in the gorge flashed by him and he remembered a sinister robotic face. That meant that Metal Sonic had brought him here and could very well suggest that the same Metal Sonic was still lurking in the area. It wasn't a comforting thought.

There was a shuffle down by his feet and when Silver looked, he actually shrieked.

The Tails Doll was sat there, legs crossed, hands in lap, just like a nursing child. It was staring up at Silver with round dead eyes but, other than that, wasn't moving or saying anything.

"Oh... my..." Whatever word was going to come after that was lost as Silver tried to steady his racing heart and keep his quills from rising up and digging into him. "...H-Hey there."

He jumped as the Tails Doll squeaked and hopped up to it's feet in an unnatural lurch and then flew off into the darkness. Silver couldn't quite see beyond a certain point so the fact that he now couldn't anticipate where that terrifying doll had gone seemed to frighten him even more. _'But_,' he firmly told himself, '_you aren't going to show that you're scared. That's what the Tails Doll wants - it LIKES people to be scared of it_.'

Silver shuddered. He remembered being told about the Tails Doll before he had ever lain eyes on it. Back when he was still a teenager.

_"The Tails Doll is nightmare material,_" Amy Rose had once explained, "_Dr Eggman created the Tails Doll and Metal Knuckles as partners or helpers for Metal Sonic. The thing with Tails Doll though is... he's not like the other two. He isn't a metal skinned robot. He's an endoskeleton wrapped in cloth with a computer brain and a twisted AI. Don't turn your back on him. Ever. He can move in absolute silence and you won't know he's there until... Well, you get the idea. From what we can gather, his main function is to keep Metal Sonic and Metal Knuckles going. Resupply them with energy or whatever. Additionally, he's practically a swiss army knife. Once he's got you, he could be capable of doing anything - he could be hiding all sorts underneath his fabricated skin. Like Inspector Gadget... except more Tails-like. And insane."_

Silver tried turning his head but he couldn't see very far no matter where he looked. He couldn't see the Tails Doll and he certianly couldn't hear him.

What he DID hear, however, was the threatening approach of heavy metal footsteps and what he COULD see were a pair of sharp red optics glaring at him from the dark.

Metal Sonic emerged from the shadowy curtain from the direction that Tails Doll had run to. Silver grimaced as he caught sight of the plush holding onto Metal Sonic's back like a baby monkey would cling to its mother, peeking over Metal's shoulder with it's unsupported head hanging way over to one side.

"Hello again," Silver gulped, trying to image a worse situation than this! Metal Sonic and the Tails Doll, two of the _WORST_ robots ever created, kept quiet. "...Erm... Am I allowed to ask where I am?"

Somewhere in Metal Sonic's throat, Silver heard a buzz. Then the screen on the left began to type out a single word and a robotic 'text-to-speak' voice replied: "**No**."

It was the same automated voice that Silver remembered him using last time. Metal Sonic normally couldn't talk but, in the time he had spent trying to upgrade himself, he had found a way of using audio clips hashed together from old voice files from Dr Eggman's systems to give the impression he was talking by using computers.

His true voice however, remained a mystery to all but one organic.

"Right," Silver murmured, cursing the fact that he sometimes talked when he got nervous, "Uh, can I ask why I'm here?"

"**YeS**."

There was something about Metal's eyes that Silver found very hard to look away from. He hated that it was a robot. He hated that it was a hedgehog. He hated that it was modelled after Sonic... He hated it.

"...Ah, uh... Why, um, why am I here?" he asked.

"**I brOugHt yoU heRe**," replied Metal Sonic's fake voice from the television screen, "**I NEed yOu**."

"Oh, okay." Silver swallowed again and felt his neck tighten. "Okay. Well, um..." He coughed awkwardly. "This is a little embarassing but, uh... I'm not Sonic. I mean I- I know I _look_ like Sonic, 'cause, you know, same face and all but, um... No, I'm not Sonic. I'm _Silver_. See, it's clever because of my fur, see? Too grey to be white and uh... hehe... too white to be grey so..." He coughed again. "...Silver."

Metal Sonic did not seem impressed but Silver was too nervous to stop now.

"...And my shoes are different..."

"**SiLenCe**!" Metal Sonic barked, taking a step towards his captive, causing the hedgehog's ears to flatten. Then, composing himself once more, added, "**I knOw wHo YOu arE, SILVER thE HeDGeHog**."

"...So you know I'm not Sonic."

"**It's A grEaT shaMe, bUt yeS. I knoW, MorE thAn aNyoNe aliVe, THat yoU Are noT SONIC**." From the robot came an odd sound which could very well be mistaken for a sigh. "**I'll lEt hiM fRet aBOut me For A liTTle WhilE loNgEr**."

Silver looked from Metal Sonic to Tails Doll, who had yet to alter his creepy, broken-neck posture as he stared.

"...Look, uh, Metal Sonic..." he began, trying to moisten his dry mouth, "I, _obviously_, don't know what you're planning on doing or why, for some reason, you've decided to bring me to... wherever the heck we are right now... but you know Sonic isn't going to like this, don't you?"

The way Metal's optics glimmered was enough to let Silver know that, had he a mouth, Metal would be smiling.

"**I'M coUntiNg oN it."**

"OH!" Silver then said in realisation, "So this is a, what, hostage thing? Is that what we're doing? 'Turn yourself in or your friend gets it' type of deal?"

Metal tilted his head slightly. "**AnD whY WoulD I chOosE you As My viCtiM aNd gO thRougH aLL THat effoRt of MimicKing chAOs enerGy to DrAw you iN wHen I CoUld haVe mAde tHingS EaSy by GOing aftEr the LikEs of TAILS or AMY oR EVen KNUCKLES?"**

"Huh..." Silver quietly mused, "...that's a fair question. Ah!" He looked triumphant. "Because if you took a _really_ close friend of Sonic's, you could run the risk of him getting REALLY mad at you. And we've all seen that, right? We've all seen Dark Sonic (well, that's not entirely true, I suppose). So by taking me, you can avoid that?"

"**AlloW me To shUT dOwn yoUr tHeory, SILVER**." Metal lifted one hand and scratched Tails Doll under the chin. "**YoU arE noT heRe As my hoStage**."

"Oh," Silver hummed, "Not good enough to be a hostage, huh?"

"**YOu arE heRe to Help mE**."

Silver looked up sharply. "I...beg your pardon?"

"**FreT Not**," Metal Sonic told him, "**YoUr serVicEs wiLL not Be reQUired fOr toO lonG. TheRe is sOMe inForMatioN whicH I neEd to conFirm anD fiNalise on And, in oRder to dO so, I aM in NeeD of soMeoNe wHo is inTunE with tHe simPle sCience of tIme TRavel**."

That took Silver by surprise and he frowned. "You want to travel through time? Why? AH-!"

He let out another shriek after he was cut off by darkness suddenly enveloping his vision as a pair of thick industrial goggles with black plastic 'lenses' were tightly strapped around his head, blinding him from seeing anything. They smelt of burnt rubber and metal and they felt suckered to his face no matter how hard he shook his hurting head. Beyond the putrid smell of the goggles, Silver could also pick out the scent of another robot and he didn't need all his brain cells working to figure that it was probably Metal Knuckles - just to complete the creepy little trio.

The automated voice continued to speak to him without the visual aid of the screen.

"**DiD you nOt hEar**?" Metal Sonic was saying, "**I haVE inforMAtioN which NeEds to be claRifieD and I am unABle to Do this heRE. The tiMe gaTes that I ONce useD a lonG tiMe aGo no loNger worK wIthOut thE tiMe stonEs. So you Will takE me to THe fuTUre**."

"Take this thing off my face!"

"**ANd alloW yoU to uSe your miNd poWErs**?" A robotic chuckle. "**I tHINk noT**."

That was when Silver felt his blood run cold when something wrapped itself around his arm. Something soft on the outside but had something hard and sharp on the inside.

"Hey! Hey get off me!" Silver cried, envisioning the Tails Doll being right there. "Get off!"

"**I am nOt neeDinG yoUr conSent wiTH this, SILVER**," he heard Metal Sonic continue saying, "**I do Not NEed your PeRmiSSion. TheRE is no cHoiCe for you. Do You uNdersTand**?"

"Wh-What's that?" Silver practically whimpered, feeling the tiny paws squeeze his arm tighter. "Is that the Tails Doll? Get him off me!"

Metal Sonic took great delight in seeing Silver squirm and he glanced to the Tails Doll who was still perched on the back of his shoulder. **"...It's noT the TAILS DOLL. ThE TAILS DOLL is wiTh mE**."

That seemed to frighten Silver more. If it wasn't the Tails Doll... "What's touching my arm? Get it off!"

"**I aSKed you A queStiOn**," Metal told him, "**Do yOu UnderstAnd whAt you neEd to dO**?"

"I'm not helping you do _squat_!" Silver venomously spat. His aggitation at not being able to see or safely use his powers or even to see what was touching him was giving way to aggression. "What kind of information are you looking for? How do I know you're not going to use that information against my friends?"

Metal Sonic took a step towards him. "...**I gO tO the futUre To look fOr infoRmatioN aBout **_**you**_**. DOes thaT makE You fEel bettEr**?"

Silver heard the step Metal took. More importantly, he heard what Metal said.

"What!? No! Not really!" When Metal didn't seem to say anything else, Silver tried calming himself down by taking long even breaths. "..W-Why? Why information about me? What do you want, Metal?"

"**I Want tO knOw whaT cOnnEcts you To SONIC THE HEDGEHOG**."

And there it was. Silver knew, just like everyone knew, that sooner or later, Metal's actions converged on Sonic. Metal was his Master's Pet, after all.

"...Uh..." Silver replied, "Well, a long long time ago, in _an erased timeline _I'd like to add, I was misinformed by some guy called Meph- OW!"

Metal Sonic slapped his palm against Silver's face, careful not to let his claws scratch him. He didn't want the hedgehog too badly banged up but he couldn't abide anyone acting like Sonic. It was bad enough that Silver _looked _like Sonic (but Metal had a suspicion of the reason behind _that_).

The robot took a step away and patted Tails Doll on the head. "**ComE - let us lEAve him Be for noW**," he told him and then to Silver said, "**Don't wOrry, wE'll leaVe our frieNd here witH you for CoMpany. She's verY goOD at mAking GuesTs feel weLcome. WHen you arE restED, SILVER, you Will be eXPected tO eaRn your keeP**."

"...But I don't live here," Silver squeaked, smarting from Metal's sudden slap. He heard Metal Sonic leave followed by the second pair of heavy feet which belonged to Metal Knuckles. He heard the Tails Doll giggling which grew fainter and fainter as the robots left him. "I DON'T LIVE HERE!"

The grip on his arm was still there.


	6. A Dodgy Wi-Fi Signal

**Writer's Note - A slightly longer chapter today.**

* * *

Orbot zipped by various badniks which were either on patrol or waiting on stand-by for a command as he made a bee-line for the main room.

"_Dr Eggman! Dr Eggman, Sir_!" he called as he flew in, crashing with another patrolling badnik as he did so. "_Whoops! Sorry, Motobug#k7249. Dr Eggman_!"

"Quit shouting," Eggman grumbled, sat in a chair at his desk, idly looking through camera footage, "I've got a headache."

"_Sorry Sir_." Orbot lifted a data pad. _"I have a report, Sir. From Crabmeat#dd446. You know, the one who featured in the background of your 2002 Employee Calender for the month of April? The third badnik from the left? It was holding a trumpet?"_ Eggman lowered his glasses a little and glowered at his robot henchman. Orbot quickly took the hint. "..._Well, Crabmeat#dd446 was stationed in Metallic Madness Zone..."_

Eggman made a noise at that and leant back in his chair. "I haven't been back _there _in a while..."

"_No Sir_," Orbot nodded, "_But we recently were sent a report: Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll were seen in the facility_."

Dr Eggman gave a jump and leapt from the chair, turning his full attention on Orbot. "..._What_!?" he practically bellowed in excitement.

"_We've made sure to check the other operational Badniks in that area_," Orbot told him, feeling confident that Eggman's response was positive, "_Their video feeds have confirmed it_."

"It was JUST Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll?" Eggman asked, his voice lowering, "There wasn't any sign of Metal Sonic?"

Orbot's optics dimmed. "_No Sir. But there's more. It is believed they took something from the area_."

Dr Eggman paused, his mouth in a grim line across his face. Taking several shallow breaths, he lowered his overweight frame back into his chair, running his hands over his chin in a show of mild discomfort.

"What did they take?"

Orbot checked the report. "_We, uh, don't know just yet. But we're working on it_."

"Then find out!" Eggman barked, his sudden flare of anger causing Orbot to jolt a few centimeters into the air. "Metal Sonic was particularly fond of Metallic Madness Zone. He knew the inside and outside of that place and you could guarantee he knew which working robot was stationed where. He knows the machinary, the knows the pathways, he knows which of the cameras are on the blink!"

Eggman spun round in his chair and held his head in hands.

"One of the lasers has a hiccup? Metal knows," he mumbled, "One of the saw blades has a chip in it? Metal knows. He's sent the other two to get something for him and I want you to find out what because whatever it is, _Metal knew it was there_." He looked back to Orbot and raised his voice again. "Do you understand? We could be close to tracking Metal Sonic down if we know what it is he's after."

"_Yes Dr Eggman_." Orbot saluted and quickly retreated from the room to find Cubot.

Eggman took off his glasses and rubbed his old eyes, eyes which had seen plenty of things that the average human couldn't even begin to imagine. He wanted to know where Metal Sonic was. Without Eggman's guidance, that robot could get severely out of hand even IF he was doing something in Eggman's name.

* * *

Steele was delighted to see his mother when she arrived at Tails' house with Knuckles, Rouge and Ruby-Lei. His mother's calm demeanor, however, drastically changed once he and Ruby had left to continue drawing with Rosemary under Cream's watchful supervision.

Blaze swept each of the heroes stood in the room with a piercing gaze. "Five minutes starting now, tell me everything."

So Team Dark recounted their story of their trip to the ruins (Knuckles took a discrete interest in their brief description of the Nocturnus Clan's buildings) and Sonic revealed that he'd managed to establish a very brief contact period with Metal Sonic shortly before Team Dark's run in with him.

Blaze listened to each of them with a passive expression, keeping quiet after they'd finished, as though reviewing everything in her head.

That was when she wheeled round and grabbed Sonic by his furry chest, small tongues of fire igniting around her wrists.

"Why?" she demanded in a loud voice, "Why Silver? What does your freak metal copy want with Silver?"

"I don't know!" Sonic told her, eyes widening in a panic as he attempted to prise Blaze off him.

Tails placed a hand at her shoulder. "Blaze, please calm down."

"You're meant to know Metal, aren't you?" Blaze went on, her pupils becoming angry slits, "Life data, I was told. What's going on his sick head?"

"If I knew, Blaze," Sonic replied, "I would tell you."

"Please, Blaze, let him go!" Amy begged in a distressed voice.

Realising this, Blaze immediately released Sonic, smoothing his fur back into place and apologising.

"If you want someone to blame, blame me," Shadow said, stepping forward, "I'm the one who asked him to come with us in the first place."

"No..." Blaze sniffed, holding her arm, "I'm sorry." She wiped at her eyes and lowered her head as her voice resumed it's usual soft tones. "Did... did you see where Metal Sonic took him?"

Shadow also avoided eye contact by turning his head. "He used Chaos Control. Disappeared into thin air."

"Let's think logically," Amy then piped up, "What possible reason could Metal have for wanting to hurt Silver? That sick walking scrap iron only wants either total domination (be it for himself or for Eggman) or..." Her voice trailed off and her throat tightened. She hadn't said Sonic's name but her silence implied it quite loudly.

Knuckles cleared his throat. "So it wasn't a simple case that Silver has Sonic's face." (He metally congratulated himself for unintentionally rhyming.)

"By that logic, why didn't Metal settle for Shadow?" Rouge pointed out.

Shadow let out a _hmmph_. "That robot couldn't hold me long enough."

"...So what's our next move?" asked Blaze, "I mean, given what this team goes through on a regular basis, I'd assume someone's got a plan brewing, right? Tails?" She turned expectantly to the fox, fully trusting that the genius had a plan of action already mapped out in his fast-working brain.

Tails, however, bit his tongue and turned his blue eyes on his best friend and brother. "...I know it's selfish of me to ask, Sonic, but could you do something?"

Sonic balled his fists. "What do you need?" he asked.

"I don't need anything," Tails answered, shaking his head, "I'm thinking that we have to find Silver and the liklihood is that he's wherever Metal Sonic is so..." He shrugged and wagged his tails again. Foxes didn't wag their tails like a dog did, they snaked their tails so that they swished like a cat's.

Sonic's face clouded. "You want me to find Metal?"

"I was thinking maybe if you tried synchronising...?"

"I haven't done that in years, Tails," Sonic frowned, "_Communicating_ is hard enough when it's a two-way connection but when I'm shut out, I'm shut out. _Synchronising_ is another thing altogether."

"What would make it easier?"

"Well, _not_ synchronising." But looking at the faces of his friends, Sonic let out a long sigh. "...The only thing that _might_ work is if I'm close enough to perhaps pick up a trace of him." Several pairs of hopeful eyes turned to him. "If I put enough concentration into it, of course. But that'll mean sprinting off all over the planet which can, essentially, be likened to trying to hold out your phone in different corners of the room when your Wi-Fi is dodgy."

"**And even then, you're not guaranteed Internet acesss**," Omega quietly whined. He was crouched in the corner by the potted plant in the window.

"Right," Sonic agreed, "But that would be my best shot and I couldn't promise anything."

"...Would you do it? For me?" Blaze asked, staring at Sonic, her close friend, very intensely.

Sonic hesitated. On the one hand, he desperately wanted to save Silver and help Blaze... but on the other hand...

He looked at Amy.

...On the other hand, his wife was due to give birth any day and who knew how long it would be until Sonic could find Metal.

"Oh, of course," Blaze said, realising the situation. "This couldn't have happened at a worse time..."

Amy, who was sat on the sofa, adamantly shook her head. "No, don't worry about me. I'll do my best to NOT encourage anything but, at the end of the day, it's out of my hands." Holding her tummy, she did look a trife worried.

It was another side effect of Sonic's chaos energy: the doctor's had warned that once Amy went into labour, birth would be imminent. No child of Sonic's would take their sweet time when it came to being born and there would only be literal _minutes_ between the start of labour and the actual birth. They'd be out within the hour and there was a real chance that Sonic might miss the birth altogether.

"Well..." he said, knowing this, "don't be by yourself."

"I won't be alone," Amy assured him, "Blaze can come stay with me, can't you?"

Blaze looked surprised. "Steele too?"

"Well what sort of Aunt would I be if I said no to that cutie pie?" Amy smiled.

Blaze nodded and finally found a smile of her own. "It's the least I can do seeing as I'm practically forcing Sonic to go off to find a Wi-Fi signal..."

"Hardly 'forcing' him," Rouge chuckled, "You know Big Blue has a soft spot for Silver. Just like he has one for Shadow here..."

Shadow let out a very quiet growl under his breath, "I thought we agreed to not fight in front of Omega, _Rouge_."

Rouge simply smiled.

"Rouge is right," Sonic said, "Silver's my friend. I'll do what I can."

* * *

Before he left, Sonic popped in to see his honourary nephew and nieces, saying hello to Cream as he did so. Rosemary was the first to see him when he stepped into the room and she beamed at him.

"Uncle Sonic!" she greeted with perfect pronounciation.

"Uncle Sonip!" Ruby greeted just after with a slight lisp.

"Unca Snic!" Steele greeted, more interested in saying it quickly than focusing on how to pronounce it.

"Hey Gumdrops," Sonic smiled at them, heart wrenching at the sight of Silver's son, who had no idea what fate had befallen his father, "are you playing nicely?"

"I drewed the babies," Ruby proudly announced, holding up her piece of paper.

"She drew the babies you and Aunty Amy are going to have," Rosemary felt the need to repeat. The young precocious part of her liked the fact that she was more grown-up than her playmates and there were times when she felt as though their 'childish' talk needed translating for the adults.

Sonic studied the drawing and sweat-dropped at the sheer number of blue and pink (predominantly pink) scribbled balls there were.

"Wow," he whistled, "that's...that's a lot of babies..." He and Amy were the only ones who knew how many hoglets they were having but the thought of having... he did a quick count... 18 of them was more than a little daunting.

"She says they're all rolled up into hedgehog balls and that's why they're all spikey," Rosemary explained.

"I hope they aren't rolled up when they're born," Sonic murmured to himself. "Poor Ames... There are a lot of pink ones there, Ruby-Lei."

Ruby still had her pink pencil in her hand and she jabbed it at the paper. "Pink one here and here and here."

"She thinks most of them will be pink like Aunty Amy," Rosemary said, in a manner-of-fact way.

"And let's see... _one_ blue one. Aw just one?" Sonic pouted comically.

"I drewed a bluuue one here." Ruby pointed to the single blue ball in the middle of the page.

"She thinks you'll have one blue one," Rosemary echoed, picking up a pencil off her lap. Now that she was getting older, her colours were growing brighter and her foxglove shaped skirt was beautifully yellow which meant it was easier for darker coloured stains to show up. The upper half of her looked a lot like Cosmo still.

Sonic shrugged and glanced at the silver kitten sat at the table, busy runining his red crayon around the page. "...I notice you're not chipping in with any comments, Steele."

Steele looked up when he heard his name and politely held out his hand. "Unca Snic! Wid-de a-wanta cayon?"

"No, that's okay buddy," Sonic replied, before Rosemary could 'helpfully' translate, "You keep the crayon and do your drawing. But hey listen..." He looked up and spoke to the whole table. "I'm going to go out for a bit and I need you three to be EXTRA good for the grown-ups, okay? Keep a close eye on them for me and make sure they look after you. They've promised they won't do anything naughty and they won't have any tantrums, so can you all promise me you'll do the same too?"

"I'm a good girl," Ruby informed her uncle, very proudly.

Rosemary, however, began to let her eyes shine in delight. "Are you going to run, Uncle Sonic?"

"Uh, yes," Sonic nodded, knowing full well how obsessed the youngsters were with his fast feet, "Yes, they'll be a bit of running, yep."

Rosemary's little smile grew into a grin. "Really REALLY fast again?"

"FAAAAAAASSSSS!" Steele suddenly cried and, with renewed vigor, began to zoom his crayon around the page.

"Heh, I do tend to run a bit fast don't I?"

"Really fast and go BOOM!" Ruby exploded her hands out as she said this.

"Oh, yeah that's-"

"Daddy says it's called a _sonic_ boom and that's why you're Sonic and it makes a BIG bang like an explosion and it happens when you break the..." Rosemary hesitated for a second halfway through her rapid explanation and gesticulated her tiny hands, "Um, the sound wall thingy."

"Sound barrier," Sonic nodded, "Yeah. That's what I do. But that's why I don't run that fast _all _the time, because it would hurt people's ears."

Rosemary picked up her pencil again, began to continue drawing, and then stopped again. "Why is the sound wall invisible?"

Sonic rubbed at his ears. "You know what? Why don't you ask your dad that, eh? He'll tell you all about soundwaves and sound barriers and compressed air. But I've got to go now."

Rosemary's pencil fell from her hands as she looked up in an instant. "Is Aunty Amy having the babies now?" she gasped.

"...No, Gumdrop," Sonic sighed, sorry to disappoint, "Not yet."

* * *

The bird song wasn't quite as merry around this part of the forest and only a few brave birds felt the need to chirp out a few notes. The uneasiness wasn't lost on Big the Cat, nor on his companion, Froggy III.

Still, fishing was fishing.

"Fishing, fishing, fishing..." Big was singing, to make up for the lack of bird song, trying to convince them that singing was safe to do. "You think I'll catch a big one, Froggy?" Big asked, baiting his line and settling down on the side of the small river. "Hope so. I'm real hungry!"

Froggy III rubbed at his face and croaked before hopping away a little distance. Big could see him from the corner of his eye as the little amphibian explored the area, not straying too far but enjoying a little taste of freedom. Big had just cast his line when he heard a very sharp croak from off to his side.

"What you got, buddy?" the cat asked, climbing up onto his feet and coming over.

Froggy III was still hoping around the object and he croaked again. It was a fish that had washed up on the mud bank. But it wasn't the sort of fish that Big would touch with a ten foot fishing pole.

"Oh, that's a bad fish," Big hissed. The fish was sickly pale and had discoloured eyes. It had been dead for a long time, by the looks of things. "No good, Froggy. Huh, another one..." There was a weak splash as a similar looking fish came wriggling up on the bank. "What if someone tries to catch one of these fish, Froggy? These are bad fish. Someone could get sick. Better find out where they're coming from..."

Looking upstream, Big began to follow the river, picking up Froggy III with his fishing rod and carefully stepping around the muddier, squelchy parts of the river bank. After a few minutes, Big came to a halt when he almost walked face first into a chicken wire fence that ran straight through the middle of the forest. It was covered in warning signs, deterring anyone thinking about climbing over or trying to get in at all. The blaring 'Radiation Warning' symbols were a deterrent in themselves without the writing that went with it.

"That's not good," Big mewed to himself, frowning at the water of the river that ran through the fence from the other side. "This water is bad, Froggy, don't swim in it." Pausing in silence to slowly get his head round things, Big came to a conclusion. "Someone could get real sick. We better tell someone about this..."

* * *

"You know I'm always wondering if I have everything I need and I KNOW the answer is yes, but I still end up buying an extra pack of diapers," Amy was saying, shaking her head as her things went through the checkout. "Every time."

Blaze had accompanied Amy while she went out shopping that evening for extra food for her and Steele. Cream was going to take Steele round to Amy's house once he had spent enough time with Rosemary and Ruby. But Blaze was still being quiet that evening, humming one word responses to Amy's questions and offering weak smiles when Amy had asked her about food preferences.

"Sonic was going to make omelettes tonight," Amy tried saying, fishing for her purse in her bag, "My lazy backside didn't want to cook..."

"Oh, I'm sorry," Blaze immediately began to apologise, "I didn't-"

"No, no! I was going to suggest, why don't we get take out? You hungry for anything?"

Blaze folded her arms and shrugged. "...I don't know."

The pink hedgehog glanced at her and felt her heart break for Blaze. "...I understand," she replied in a soothing voice, "Just let me know if you suddenly get a hankering for shwarma. Oh, personal question, did you get any weird cravings when you had Steele on the way? Because every time I see a pack of humus, I just want to grab some cucumber and dive right in, you know? I'm not even that keen on humus..."

"Amy, you know when Sonic went missing?"

Amy had finished paying for her things and Blaze was now carrying the bags.

"...When?" Amy had to ask, "That time four years ago? Or way before?"

"When you were engaged and we didn't know where he was." That was the incident four years ago which had involved a brother of Eggman's. "How did you cope?"

Amy stopped and gave it proper thought. "...The same way I've learnt to cope since I accepted the kind of person Sonic is," she answered, "Whatever happens to him, I just have to accept that he's got things under control. He survives. The same goes to the likes of Shadow and Knuckles..." A gentle hand rested itself on Blaze's shoulder. "Silver's a lot like Sonic, in more ways than the obvious. Silver's a survivor too. Whenever Sonic goes missing or appears to be in trouble then, yeah, I'm worried. But I'm also confident that he can walk out of it okay. You have to trust that Silver can take care of himself."

"I know..." Blaze sighed, trying to smile as they continued walking towards the exit, "He's just... so naive sometimes."

"If it makes you feel better, Metal Sonic was designed to deal with Sonic, not Silver," Amy said with a sparkle in her eyes, "Wouldn't surprise me if that tin can just gives up trying to work out how to deal with him."

She then stopped as she almost collided with another shopper as they came to the automatic doors.

"Whoop. Sorry ladies," the gentleman apologised instantly, taking a hurried step back and shoving what appeared to be _drumsticks_ into the pocket of his jacket.

"No problem," Amy smiled politely, "After you."

"When you got here first?" The stranger, a green coloured hedgehog with unruly spines, shook his head and held up his paws. "I insist. Pearls before swine, as my sister likes to tell me."

"Ha, sounds like something my husband would say too," Amy chuckled and gratefully walked out with Blaze at her side. "Thank you."

Blaze and Amy took the slow path home. Though it was evening, the summer sun was still up and decieving people into thinking it was still relatively early.

"That hedgehog looked a little like Sonic, didn't he?" Amy commented.

"You think _every_ hedgehog looks like Sonic," Blaze replied and she laughed for the first time. "Thank you, Amy," she then murmured, "I don't know what to do with myself sometimes."

"Well, if you really want to," Amy grinned, "when we get a hold of Metal, you can have first crack at him."

"I can promise several rounds of Burning Blaze on him, that's for sure."

The two friends laughed properly for the first time, their worries briefly cast away and the memory of the charming green-coloured stranger soon forgotten.

* * *

He'd had to wait until the next morning before putting his feet to the road so as to not disturb people but, as soon as the sun came up, he was away. By now, he'd had to have covered half the planet already, running down every walkway, road, street, highway... Every public footpath, every offroad pathway, every hill and mountain and brook and field. He looked like a police dog which had been let of its leash to track down a criminal and, when all was considered, that was exactly what Sonic was.

Half the planet... in 20 minutes. 5:00-5:20. Not a bad time given that it wasn't a straight run but rather a giant game of hide and seek.

But he wasn't following his sense of smell, keen as it was, but rather the tiny flutter in the back of his head which was only felt when his notorious metal counterpart was in the area or trying to reach out to him.

Sonic slowed as he neared a town, aware that while breaking the sound barrier was exhilirating and got his molecules in a dance, it was also extremely loud for those bearing witness. His trademark sonic booms gave others an adrenaline rush, certainly, but prolonged booming was not only disturbing to the wildlife but also damaging to the ears. It was well that he knew his planet like the back of his hand so that he knew when he was passing by civilisation and he could check his speed in time. Even then, some people still claimed there were times they could hear him coming - something akin to an ominous approaching thunderstorm.

The town square was bustling with traffic and pedestrian activity, no sign that they were suffering any kind of attack from Eggman or any of Eggman's badniks which was a welcome relief to the hedgehog. Any indication that innocent people were under an oppressive pressure from Sonic's enemies would have been picked up almost immediately, especially by someone who had developed a seventh sense for anything which reeked of Robotnik.

It was therefore both a comfort and an annoyance that there was no flutter of Metal Sonic.

Hissing under his breath, Sonic quickly made a rapid search of the whole town, travelling so quickly that only a handful was aware that their famous hero had paid a visit. But the search turned up nothing and Sonic stopped to curse to himself and prepare to move on to the other half of the planet.

_I can't afford this_ he continuously repeated over and over in his head. Silver and Blaze were counting on him and he had the oppurtunity to find Metal Sonic along with that. To top it off, Amy could contact him any second and annouce that his hoglets were about to be born.

The reflection in the shop window revealed a very torn hedgehog when Sonic looked. He desperately wanted to just run back to Amy to be there with her for the birth but the uncertainty of when the babies would be born was enough to argue that there was a very high chance that, in the time they waited, they might lose Silver.

Sonic's eyes examined himself and rested on the sight of his neck.

Four years ago, he'd suffered under the hand of a malicious Dr Eggman and only been able to walk away from that bearing a horrendous scar. The fur had grown back but the shape of the scar could still be traced and felt where the fur had grown awkwardly and on damp evenings it ached. The blue hedgehog lifted his hand to his neck and rubbed it, his eyes darkening as a dangerous urge to pay Eggman back threatened to cloud his judgement. But he shook it away before it became his primary focus.

Silver was too important a team mate to allow him to be lost to Metal Sonic and he was much too valued as a friend to allow such treatment befall him.

Kicking in his heels, Sonic took off, a trail of dust giving the only indication that he was there at all.

And just as he sprinted through the country, something in the back of his head ever so briefly fluttered...


	7. The Metal Family

**Writer's Note - I, Duma, solemnly swear that I will not snitch to anyone about where you might, or might not, be reading stories. I certainly will NOT tell anyone if you happen to be reading at, say... work. (I got your back, celliemossie.)**

* * *

Dr Eggman looked up sharply as Orbot and Cubot returned.

"Well?" he snapped impatiently.

"None of the large machinery have been taken, Sir," Orbot told him, "Or tampered with."

"What about other equipment?" Eggman pressed, "Weapons?"

Cubot made an odd noise. "...We're down a capsule."

Eggman's frown deepened. "What kind of capsule?"

"One of the minibot capsules for the Gachapandora Mech," Orbot said.

His master said nothing. He simply rubbed his temples and looked worried.

"...Does that mean something, Sir?"

"...It means that we've got more to worry about."

* * *

If you were to ask Silver if he had any flaws he may have admitted that he tended to talk a lot when he got nervous around new people. When it was something he couldn't see, blinded and tied up in a cold metal tunnel, chattering seemed to be the only thing keeping him focused.

"I don't live here," he was muttering to himself. The unknown friend of Metal Sonic's had released his arm but that did nothing to calm his nerves because now he hadn't the faintest idea where it was. He was ridiculously tired but he wouldn't dare sleep - not with those robots out there and unaccounted for. "I don't live here. I don't... I don't live here. I don't live here... I got friends. ... It's cold. ... I can hear the wind. ... "

"**He hAteS it**."

Silver jumped and almost bit through his tongue. It was the first time that the voice, who he could only presume belonged to this mystery enemy, had spoken to him and what was even more unnerving was the fact that the voice sounded as though it belonged to a very young roboticised girl.

"Ffff-" Silver broke off before he swore, "Who-?" His mouth went dry and he felt his spines begin to tremble again. "You're the, um... the one keeping me 'company'." He thought he heard something move over to his left. "A-Are you going to hurt me?"

A pause. Then the robot girl's voice came again, "**No**."

Silver turned his ears this way and that, swivelling them as far as he could stretch as he tried to pinpoint the source of the sound.

"... Where are you?" he asked.

His answer, however, was a long high-pitched giggle and the returning sound of heavy metal footsteps.

"**It's beeN sevEraL houRs. GoOd morNing**," Metal Sonic's voice now addressed him. "**ARe you ReaDy**?"

"What am I doing?"

"**You aRe telliNg me HoW I can tRaveL to thE futUre**."

"You can't," Silver said defiantly, bracing for another sharp slap, "Not unless you have the Time Stones from Little Planet. Or at least two Chaos Emeralds."

"**I haVe 1 CHAOS EMERALD**."

"That's...not enough."

The slap didn't come but he did hear a warning growl. "**And aM I to asSuMe, theN, tHat you havE two CHAOS EMERALDs on yoUr perSon at All timEs for WHen you muSt TravEL**?"

"Well," Silver gulped, "no it's different for me."

"**HOw sO**?"

Silver was being backed into a corner. "...It's complicated."

At that moment, the goggles which were blinding him were removed but because of the darkness around him, Silver didn't flinch at the sudden ability to see. He _did _flinch at the sight of Metal Sonic, however, stood only 30 centimeters from his chair. Metal Knuckles was walking round to the side with the goggles hanging off his arm and the Tails Doll now finding a perch on _his _shoulders instead.

In Metal Sonic's hand, sat perfectly in his palm with two floppy legs hanging either side, sat another doll, slightly smaller than the Tails Doll.

"**InTroducTion**," Metal Sonic said, holding his hand out closer to Silver so that he had to lean away warily, "**ThiS is THe AMY DOLL. She wAs the oNly salvAgeabLe oNe lefT of HEr BAtch wheN METAL KNUCKLES and TAILS DOLL went tO retriEve HEr. She haS beEn the onE LOokinG aFter you. You oWE her your GraTitude**."

The doll was about half the size of Tails Doll but still had the chilling dead eyes and the messily stiched seams. Except this doll was pink felted and resembled a younger version of Amy, dressed in a green and orange dress.

"There's an Amy Doll now?!" Silver cried, "Since _when_? Does Amy know?"

"**HArdlY your buSineSS**," Metal Sonic answered him, letting Amy Doll hop off his hand on into Silver's lap, much to Silver's discomfort. "**AMY DOLL is knoWn for pOssessiNg a spECific sKill seT. As I'm Sure you'vE Been tOLd, the TAILS DOLL sUppOrts anD suppLies METAL KNUCKLES And I wiTh pOWer. The AMY DOLL is mOre inteREsTed in orGanIc crEatuRes suCH as yOursELF**."

"Define 'interested'," Silver almost stammered, keeping the Doll in his sight at all times.

Amy Doll, stood on two legs, flopped forward and hugged Silver's chest, almost reminding Silver of the moment he had met _organic_ Amy for the first time when she had mistaken him for Sonic. Except he wasn't so much 'weirded' by this hug - it was more accurate to say that he was petrified.

And he had every right to be once he felt a bolt of hot electricity connect with his spine and go shooting up into his head.

Opening his mouth, Silver screeched as Metal Sonic sadistically watched.

"**THe AMY DOLL can coNnecT to aN orgAnic NeRvous sYStem**," Metal Sonic was helpfully explaining, once the pain passed. "**And liKe her Inferior, shE is paRTIculaRly cliNgy. QuitE diffiCult to REmove**."

Silver was shocked a second time before he could say anything. This time, however, a metal container somewhere behind him lit up in a blue aura and was thrown across the room as, in his pain, Silver had accidently caught something with his fluctuating psychic power. He whimpered again and grit his teeth, trying not to let his mental state flare up as waves of pain coursed up and down his back.

"**I'm sure You're FinDing it haRd to thINK stRaight**," Metal Sonic simply said, unfazed by the now splintered metal container that Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll were looking at, "**So lOng as AMY DOLL has yOu in her GRaSp, you Won't be uSing your PoWer freeLy. Now, ARe you goiNg to tEll me WhAt I want to KNow or mUst AMY DOLL coAx the aNswer ouT of yOU**?"

Silver arched his back as Amy Doll shocked him again and a lightbulb exploded somewhere down the tunnel. He could barely keep it together and he was terrified what his power might do.

"**On a mOre UNsiGnifiCant noTe, AMY DOLL caN alSo deToNate liKe aN exPloSive...**"

"A machine!" he gasped out as Amy Doll ceased her torment, "I can... I can mentally connect to a machine in the future which uses the powers of chaos to open up a time portal. Like a doorway." He was panting heavily, his lungs and heart working over time to keep from failing him.

Amy Doll looked up at Metal Sonic proudly and she was rewarded with a stroke.

"**Our futuRe oWNs the scieNce of tiMe traveL and no-One besiDes yourSElf useS it?" **Metal Sonic asked as he petted Amy Doll's head.

Silver could feel the sweat around his face and it was dampening his fur as he heaved air. "I wouldn't say... that the _entire _future owns it. Only... the company that built the machine."

"**And tHat coMpaNy... Who arE theY**?"

Silver opened his mouth but only gulped more oxygen, adamantly shaking his head.

**"ThE G.U.N.?" **Metal Knuckles prompted from the back.

Silver was too tired to protest any further. "...What remained of them."

"**THEy werE your emPLoyers**?" Metal Sonic asked but Silver weakly shook his head.

"N-No. They just gave me the machine. I think. I can't remember." He was being truthful and Metal Sonic could see that in his eyes.

"**Do you remEmber **_**anythiNg **_**abOut your PeOple**?" he asked, "**The oneS thaT gAVe yoU suCh imPressiVe taleNts**?" A long claw was lifted up and was gently tapped against Silver's forehead.

"My... My people?" Silver's brow furrowed more but he was so tired that he couldn't even think and he let his head hang. "No I... Not..."

"**It mAtteRs litTle to Me**." Metal Sonic nodded at Amy Doll. "**TurN your AttenTion to ThiS maCHine of yours And oPen a doORWay for mE**."

"Why?" asked Silver, his heart sinking as he felt Amy Doll take hold of him again.

"**I've alrEady TolD you Why**," Metal Sonic answered, **"I neEd inFormAtion onLy fouNd in The futURe**."

"Information about... me?"

"**That iS correCt. ProceEd**."

It took Amy Doll ten minutes to finally break Silver enough for his vulnerable brain to keel to their wishes and a glowing, almost translusent wormhole shimmered into view just behind Silver's chair. As it did so, the Chaos Emerald in Metal's possession began to glow.

"**The CHAOS EMERALD is reaCtinG**," Metal Knuckles noted, stepping forward with Tails Doll.

"**CHAOS ENERGY is inDeed inVolvEd**," Metal Sonic nodded, "**But I DouBt it iS jUst the mAchiNe's doiNg**..." Saying that, he looked pointedly at Silver who was now slumped miserably in his chair with his eyes shut and his limbs shaking. "**HavE AMY DOLL enCourAGe a neW poRtaL in 3 hOurS**." By his calculations, he'd be back in this world at 12:00 noon.

Metal Sonic walked toward the portal and made a show of patting Silver on the head as he passed by. Amy Doll found that entertaining and she hopped up beside Tails Doll to share a giggle with him.

But just as the robot hedgehog stood on the threshold of the portal, he froze as a familiar tingle caused his processor to buzz warningly. It was a signal which activated once it felt the nearby source of its programming.

"...**SONIC**?" Metal Sonic murmured quietly to himself, making sure that his connection to the blue hedgehog was firmly shut off. He could only sense Sonic if his counterpart were actively seeking him but there was no telling how far away he was. "_**He is close. Years of trying to reach him and he is only now within my grasp just I must leave? This is the situation in which fleshly beings say 'typical'. No matter. I will be gone before he can do anything. And when I return**__..._" Metal Sonic stepped through the portal to the future. "_**I'll be sure to give him the attention he deserves**_."

* * *

No-one else he had left behind knew that Sonic was within a certain amount of miles to them. The rest of 'Team Metal' didn't have the same bond with Sonic that Sonic's metal counterpart had. Silver certainly wasn't in any shape to be picking up on the warmth of Sonic's Chaos Energy signature.

He did, however, turn his head slightly to get a better look at Metal Knuckles, with Tails Doll and Amy Doll hanging off both shoulders.

"What are you after?" he asked, his voice sounding a little croaky at first. Metal Knuckles glanced at him briefly but otherwise ignored him. Tails Doll cocked his head on one side and waved his antennae and Amy Doll just twitted to herself. "...So Metal Sonic leaves and that's it? Vow of silence?"

"**TheY don't liKe talkinG to aNYone but thEir Inferiors**," Amy Doll then informed him, nodding her head to Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll. She then flopped over and slid down Metal Knuckles to the floor, clumsily hopping over to the chair. "**BuT I don't MInd talkING tO **_**you**_**."**

Silver shivvered as she came closer and he felt his fur bristle as she came and began patting at his feet. "Is Metal Sonic your spokesperson then?" he asked her.

"**He iS our coMmaNDer**," Amy Doll replied and, for a second, Silver thought he could imagine an awed voice full of respect coming from her. Of course, her voice was a roboticised young child's voice so that imagery didn't last long. "**He's beEn onLine loNGer thaN anY of uS. He Is stRong**."

"And what does your strong commander want? If no-one else will give me a straight answer..."

"**He waNts infOrMatioN abOut y-"**

"I mean in the long run!" Silver interrupted her, his professional 'Member of the Resistance' side overcoming his naive 'Prisoner of War' side. He'd only relented to the robots when he feared his power was on the brink of becoming unstable, otherwise he'd still be tight-lipped about things right now. "What's he going to DO with said information? What's the end goal here?"

**"...He WanTs whAt wE aLL waNt**."

Silver raised an eyebrow questioningly and Amy Doll giggled again.

"**To cOnquEr the WoRld for oUr cReaTor and to bE riD of oUr Inferiors**."

"Inferiors?" Silver echoed in confusion, "What do you..." But he then answered his own question. Instead of imagining Metal Knuckles, Tails Doll and Amy Doll, it was now just normal Knuckles and normal Tails and normal Amy, in their organic bodies stood in front of him.

Inferiors. Organic inferiors.

"You want to kill my friends?" Silver hissed.

"**Be riD of tHem**," Amy Doll corrected, "_**ThaT's**_** whAt I saiD. And anY wHO atteMPt to pRotecT theM**."

Silver gave another tug at his wrists. "...For being emotionless robots, you four do know how to hold a grudge."

"**Not hOlDing a gRudGe**." Amy Doll shook her head. "**TherE shOulD onlY be One oF eveRythINng. No mOre. There cAn be ONly onE..."**

Silver had heard that before from Metal Sonic. It was clear that the same loathing of their organic counterparts carried over through all of them, hereditary or not.

But thinking of Amy in particular caused Silver to worry. After all, she was an expectant mother. What would these robots do if they found out about Sonic and Amy's children?

"You wouldn't... you wouldn't hurt Amy, would you?"

Rather than answer him, Amy Doll just smiled in her head and tapped her nose with her felted paw.


	8. Guilt, Grief and Guidance

In a grey, cloudy city, Knuckles was an appreciated blob of red for Rouge to focus on as she made her way past the commuters. He had his back to her as he sat on the bench, watching the fountain spray like the child he so often was at times, oblivious to the stares of awe that others were giving him and his daughter.

But upon recognising the approach of familiar footsteps, the echidna turned his head.

"Well?" he asked, checking his wife up and down.

"Doctor said there's no lasting damage," Rouge told him. She had been to get checked over by the G.U.N. medic. "It's all superficial and I'll heal in no time. Part of the gig, sweetie."

"Yeah," Knuckles muttered as he stood up, "but I know what Metal Sonic's like. Cuts through organics as easily as Sonic cuts through robots."

Rouge waved a hand at him non-chalently.

"I came off fine. Besides, I've had worse from you, you big brute."

"...You want me to say I'm sorry again?"

"Let's just get going," Rouge sighed, "I want to stop by the apartment before we head back."

They had planned to stop by to visit Rouge's old apartment that she had once shared with Shadow and Omega before she'd married Knuckles. She still considered it as _her _apartment and she still had the key to the front door.

"Has Shadow not spoken to you?" Knuckles asked, looking around to see in which direction Ruby had gone in.

"No," Rouge replied and looked sad, "He's been quieter than usual. No communication with him at all."

"Okay," nodded Knuckles, "I'd better save that lady over there from Ruby."

Ruby had gone wandering around the fountain, trying to catch the stray droplets that escaped over the sides. Her little white dress was damp by the time she'd caught sight of a pretty lady sat reading a magazine by herself.

She'd always been fascinated by hedgehogs. They were so like echidnas but their paws were smaller and daintier and their spines grew differently. She only knew four hedgehogs and thought that maybe this lady might like to know that there was going to be a boost to her kind very soon.

The lady had smiled through Ruby's excited ramblings about her Uncle and Aunty's babies that were due and how she was sure there were going to be lots of pink ones.

"Hey Ruby?" Knuckles called gently as he approached, "Come on, sweet, we have to get going." He looked at the lady. "Sorry if she's been bothering you." Even Knuckles was surprised to see a hedgehog. They were becoming much more uncommon, for some reason.

"Oh no, not at all," the raspberry coloured hedgehog replied, beaming at the puggle, "She's an absolute angel! And quite the celebrity. I'm honoured."

"Celebrity? Oh right," Knuckles nodded his head, remembering that the entire planet had got quite caught up in the birth of Ruby-Lei. There was a whole 'endangred species' charity funded for her. The nod, however, turned to a shake once he realised that his daughter was fingering the woman's necklace. "Uh, Ruby, that's not yours."

"Oh you like my necklace?" the lady chuckled, showing Ruby her shiny necklace in the shape of a keyboard, "She's so sweet!"

"So like her mother too," Knuckles hummed and took his daughter by her paw, "Ruby, you're not setting a good example for mama if you go around trying to take other people's jewellery. It's time to say good-bye."

Ruby waved her chubby hand. "Bye-bye."

The lady waved back. "Good-bye!"

Rouge was smiling as she watched Knuckles walk Ruby back.

"Like mother like daughter," Knuckles muttered with a smirk.

Rouge shrugged and took Ruby's other hand proudly. "You train them young."

* * *

Shadow wasn't talking to anyone. Not that this was something unusual but his standard amount of silent judging wasn't as high as it usually was. He stood without crossing his arms and he stared down at something invisible on the ground and would only move his head a fraction if Omega spoke to him.

He and Omega were back at Team Dark's apartment where they lived but Shadow hadn't slept since yesterday. It was a spacious place (to accomodate Omega's large frame) and was situated on the outskirts of Westopolis city where it was relatively more peaceful than the traffic and noise of the city central. The G.U.N had moved their headquarters to Westopolis several years ago and Team Dark felt that being close to work made the commute easier.

The penthouse provided an excellent view of the cityscape but no-one suspected that this was the reason that Shadow took to standing by himself on the balcony. That was where he was found when Knuckles and Rouge stopped by with Ruby.

"Hey," Knuckles had murmured in Rouge's ear quietly, "I think you should talk to him." He nodded his head over towards the dark hedgehog through the window.

Rouge looked at him doubtfully. "Why?"

"You're friends, aren't you?"

"Doesn't mean he'll trust me with his feelings," Rouge sighed, "You know Shadow - he doesn't open up about anything."

Knuckles shrugged. "No harm in asking, is there?"

So that was why Rouge cautiously approached one of her closest friends while Knuckles was being entertained by his daughter playing with a very large and very dangerous robot who, incidently, loved Ruby to the core. Ruby was telling him all about the nice lady she'd met by the fountain.

Shadow flicked an ear in Rouge's direction as she walked out onto the balcony and shut the double glass doors behind her.

"Knuckles was wondering if you wanted to grab a drink tonight?" she said. It was a small fib but she had picked up a few ways of initiatiing conversation with a socially inactive hedgehog.

Shadow leant against the balcony side and tapped his toe against the ground, demonstrating a tiny habit he'd picked up from Sonic.

"I'll pass."

Rouge quietly let out a long breath as she mentally prepared herself to give Shadow a good talking to.

"...You're not still upset with yourself are you?"

"I don't get upset," Shadow instantly retorted. He'd said that so many times that Rouge had accurately predicted it.

"You should know better than to lie to me, Shadow," Rouge scolded fondly, "We've known each other _how_ long, and you think I don't know how upset you get over things?"

Shadow flicked his ear again but didn't reply. Rouge slowly sauntered over and stood at the rail nearby, stretching her wings and feeling the wind resistance soothe her.

"If there's a small part of you," she murmured, "somewhere underneath all that tough exterior, that thinks that you might be to blame for what's happened, I want you punch it really hard. You got that?"

"..."

"Shadow."

Shadow grunted. "...No promises."

Rouge had a funny smile on her face now. A small smile that indicated triumph but also regret.

"...So you ARE still upset."

Another few seconds passed during which a pigeon had flown over to perch on the rail, took in the sight of two GUN agents, thought better of it, and flew off again.

"...Well, I've had to sit through your 'broods' more times than is healthy for me and the last thing I want is to have to suffer another one of them," Rouge finally said, folding her arms and leaning against her hip.

Shadow frowned and also folded his arms as he straightened up. "I'm not... I'm not brooding."

"Are you kidding me?" Rouge felt like laughing. "You're stood out on a skyscraper balcony, you've got your arms crossed and you're staring out at nothing. The only things you're paying attention to are your own thoughts."

The black and red hedgehog twitched his sensitive nose and finally looked at his friend.

"I didn't _need_ to bring Silver. We could have managed on our own."

She'd done it. She'd got him to open up. And she felt terrible for it.

"I probably would have insisted you bring someone along," she told him in a soft voice, "So then the fault would be mine. I mean, the fact I didn't dig Silver out of there faster..." Rouge looked away. "Anyway, no-one's blaming you."

"Blaze has every right to," Shadow mumbled.

"And yet she doesn't." Rouge smiled properly at last. "Nice having friends that trust you, isn't it? Now you can look at it like you used to look at situations - full of doom and gloom. Or you can look at it as we've always had to look at it when these things happen (and, let's face it, with this group it happens all the time), and that's to think positively."

She began to check things off on her gloved fingers.

"That day when Knuckles discovered that he wasn't the last of his kind when he was attacked..._ by _his own kind. We got Shade as a new ally out of that. You remember when Sonic got caught by Eggman, chained up and tortured for 6 months? He came back _smiling_. And then the fiasco four years ago..."

She lightly hit Shadow's shoulder with the back of her hand.

"Then there's you. You seem to dive into certain-death and vanish for months on end so we all end up worried sick about you but then you'll randomly turn up in the middle of a massive battle to show off and help turn the tides in our favour." Rouge sighed and shook her head. "Life used to be so much less complicated when I was a solo treasure hunter."

"Well you're the one who ruined that for yourself," Shadow piped up in a low voice, a sparkle of mischief in his eye.

"Could you blame me?" Rouge chuckled, "Confronted with a beautiful giant emerald_ and _a rugged red wildman all at once?" She looked away, still smiling. "You'll see. We'll be teasing Silver about this by next week. In the meantime, we wait on Sonic. He'll find Metal."

Shadow seemed to think about this and, at long last, produced his own kind of smile.

"...A drink would be nice."

* * *

Settled in the spare bedroom at Amy's house, Blaze woke to find her young son cuddled in her arms. This wasn't unusual; Steele always managed to wake up at some unearthly hour and quietly join either one or both of his parents in bed until one of them woke.

This time, however, Steele had watery eyes and a quivering lower lip as he tried pressing his head into his mother's chest, letting out tiny mews as he exhaled. Realising that his mother was awake, Steele looked up into his mother's eyes and sniffed.

"Dada."

Blaze's breath hitched in her throat. The only time she had cried in front of Steele was when he had just been born, premature and fighting for life. She wasn't ready to start crying in front of him now.

"...He'll be back soon, baby," she whispered, the lump in her throat stinging her.

"Dada?" Steele went on squeaking, eyes filling more and more with tears. "Wan Dada..."

"Shh shh shh." Blaze pulled him onto her tummy and rocked him back and forth. "It's okay. I want Dada too."

"Dada."

"Uncle Sonic has gone to find him."

Steele's ears pricked up. "Unca Snic getta Dada?"

"That's... That's right." Blaze paused as a sudden and very jarring thought struck her. "...Come on, Steele. Come with Mama."

Throwing off her covers and pulling her robe around her, Blaze lifted Steele up and hurried downstairs and into Amy's kitchen where she found the pink hedgehog, with her sweet round tummy, whisking up some batter in a large bowl.

Amy looked over and smiled kindly at them both.

"Good morning!" she greeted, "I'm making pancakes. Who wants some?"

"I'm sure Steele would like some, wouldn't you?" Blaze smiled in a strained way at the silver coloured kitten in her arms.

"...Wa Dada..." he sniffed, torn between getting excited for pancakes and hanging onto the fact that he was missing his father. It had only dawned on him during the night that he hadn't seen or heard from Silver in hours and he hadn't even come to read him his bedtime story.

Blaze sighed and wiped at her eyes.

"...Steele is missing Daddy today."

Her smile dropping, Amy stopped whisking and lowered her head.

"Oh..."

Giving a loud and not very princess-like _sniff_, Blaze set her son down on the ground and watched his little tail flick back and forth.

"...Amy?" she asked quietly, "What will Sonic do if- _when_ he finds Silver?"

Amy started to slowly whisk again.

"Well, he could do one of two things," she replied, "One: he finds Silver and then he calls us to let us know. Two:..."

"Two: he runs in to save Silver and we run the risk of gaining or losing both of them."

Amy gripped her whisk tighter, reminding herself to keep calm. She had thought of that possibility many times: the thought that Sonic would jump in and be the hero he was used to being. That hedgehog was an oppurtunist and if an opening came where he had a shot at saving Silver, he wouldn't hesitate, regardless of the danger.

"Maybe I should get a hold of Shadow," Blaze murmured. "Send him after Sonic just to make sure."

"Sonic will be fine. I trust him," Amy swallowed, lifting her head and resuming the pancake making with a new smile and a bright look in her eye. "And he knows if he breaks that trust, then he's in mighty big trouble. Now then - pancake?"

* * *

His gut instincts were leading Sonic through a heavily forested area where the trees seemed to grow so close to each other that they were practically sharing trunks at times. There was probably a clear footpath somewhere in this forest but Sonic hadn't the time to look for it. The flutter had briefly come and gone and all he had to follow now was the faint echoes of that flutter which wouldn't last long.

Picking his way over fallen branches and logs and over gnarled roots that protruded like enormous growths from the dirt, Sonic was again reminded of the planet's incredible diversity of life. The natural Chaos Energy of the world meant that Mobius' plants didn't always stick to the traditional 'green' pigmentation and instead were able to grow purple or blue or pink leaves in a variety of shades atop spiral shaped trunks. The forest Sonic was currently traversing appeared to have mostly normal tree trunks but grew dark blue leaves which meant, if Sonic wanted to hide, he could blend into the natural glow of the forest with almost no effort.

Those of _purple_ fur would also be hard to spot and just as Sonic was beginning to recognise a familiar scent, something large and very purple indeed came galloping around the trees with deceptive agility for his wide frame.

"Holy-!" Sonic shouted in surprise, his quills standing on end for a couple of seconds before he laughed off his brief fright. "Ha. You sure startled me, big guy."

Big the Cat had stopped himself before he had plowed into the hedgehog and he hurriedly tried to smoothe down the hero's quills.

"Sorry Sonic," he apologised, "I was just making sure there was no-one fishing around here."

"How come?" asked Sonic, kindly declining Big's attempt to sort out his tense spines.

"The fish here are bad," Big explained with a wrinkled nose. "They'll make you sick. Look, I'll show you." He then turned and went thundering back in the direction he'd ran from. Agile he might be, yes, but quiet? Not a chance.

"Big, I don't really have the time to...!" Sonic stopped mid-shout and sighed. "Well, I suppose it's the direction I'm going in anyway."

He followed Big until they reached a river running through the forest. The trees were spaced out much more which Sonic was thankful for but he didn't like the idea of sinking his beloved red and white 'sneaks' into the river mud. Big, on the other hand, squelched straight down and pointed into the river.

"Look, see?"

Using as much forest debris as he could to prevent a one-way trip into Amy's bathtub at home, Sonic made his way over and peered into the dirty water to see a very lethargic fish with odd coloured eyes swim weakly against the current.

"...That's a very sick fish," Sonic agreed and then noted a dead fish which looked similar which had washed up on the other side.

"I think they're all coming from upstream, that way," Big said, "But there's a fence there where I'm not allowed to go."

Sonic's interest peaked. "...Show me?"

The barbed chicken wire fence was an eyesore in a place like the forest but there was no mistaking its function and Sonic expertly identified and interpretted the symbols which had been stickered all over it.

"This is near that old Robotnik power plant," Sonic murmured, "The area is still polluted and radioactive, that's why this fence is up. Probably why the fish are so sick." Down where the fence had been built through the river, there was a hole where the poisoned fish were likely escaping from.

"Poor fishies," Big muttered to himself, hugging Froggy III close to his fluffy chest.

Sonic froze as another faint flutter came to him and he cursed his bad luck.

"...The thing is, I think I need to go in there."

Big looked horrified. "Why?"

"I felt a trace of Metal Sonic coming from that direction."

"Metal Sonic?" Big's large ears flattened and he swished his tail. "Ohh... I don't like that robot. I hoped he'd gone down when your island sank."

"...It wasn't my island, Big. It was Eggman's."

"Still hoped he gone down."

"Yeah, me too." Sonic looked through the trees on the other side of the fence and could just about get a whiff of a power plant scent. "But if Metal IS in there, then that's where I'm heading." At Big's quizzical look, Sonic explained, "Metal Sonic took Silver. We don't know why but hopefully soon I'll find out where."

"Silver too?" Now Big looked even more anxious. "Poor little buddy. You'll get sick if you go in there."

Sonic clenched his fist. "...Maybe..."

Then he stopped and thought about it. After all, he was a Chaos Being; someone with highly abnormal amounts of Chaos Energy coarsing through them. Someone who could absorb the energy and store it as power (or use it as a weapon in Shadow's case).

Four years ago, the question of Sonic's origins had been raised and, according to Dr Eggman, Sonic possessed the unique title of being 'Chaos Born' - someone who's very atoms and molecules and DNA strands were constructed by Chaos Energy. It was supposed to explain why Sonic seemed to endure injuries and trauma like no-one else did and why he could initiate Chaos Control with a fake Chaos Emerald and why the ancient Echidnas had prophesied about him and why the Chao were drawn to him so much and why he could change into so many forms...

But this had never been proven and Sonic had chosen to destroy the only evidence that _could _ have proven it. Chaos Born or not, Sonic didn't care. But if the unpredictable powers of Chaos had anything to do with his survival...

"... or maybe not." Sonic smiled. "If Chaos Energy can let me survive for short amounts of time in space and keep me from suffering any lasting effects from Chemical Plant Zone..."

"Then maybe it will shield you from the bad air," Big finished his sentence, looking hopeful. "...Maybe."

"That's what I'm counting on, pal," Sonic nodded and then looked up at the large cat, "I think you better stay here."

"I think I'd better stay here too," Big agreed, "Froggy won't like it in there."

"How about you try and find a way of blocking up that gap in the fence so the sick fish don't get through? We don't want anyone eating them. Might even stop them swimming back upstream to breed."

"Okay," Big smiled and watched as Sonic scaled the fence and dropped down on the other side.

* * *

**Writer's Note -**

**A huge thank you for reviews and follows! Old readers will already know but I will be sure to thank you individually in the Credits section at the end of the story.**

**On another note, I have new accounts on Wattpad and Archives of our Own for readers who don't tend to use this site very often. Chaos Born is being revised and re-uploaded for new readers! Hope to see some familiar names in the future. Stay awesome guys!**

**\- Duma**


	9. 200 Years into the Future

**What? An extra chapter? Yes, it dawned on me that I might be busy over the next few weeks with family matters so this is to tide you all over.**

**Time to see what Metal Sonic is after.**

* * *

A small apartment, not exactly decorated in any lavish detail seeing as the walls were plain grey and the ceiling was sound-proofed and the carpet was thin. There wasn't much to it at all; an old sofa with a patchwork throw, a beanbag which looked as though it had been thoroughly punctured by a spiky back and was clumsily repaired with patchwork pieces, a coffee table in the middle, a side table by the sofa with a tilted lampshade, a few minimilistic pieces of artwork on the wall... Silver didn't seem to put in much thought when it came to sprucing up his living quarters. The only thing that seemed to stick out and jar against the simplicity of everything was the enormous wall-mounted television screen that seemed to take up the _entire_ wall and the unusual aparatus which Metal Sonic concluded was the machine that Silver had spoken of.

Metal Sonic looked around the area. The drape curtains were drawn and the entire place was dark and, from the looks of things, in need of a vaccume cleaner. Through one door was the kitchen which consisted of an island counter with just one barstool, an oddly designed refrigerator (perhaps it was the common design of the future) that made a continuous low humming noise, a futuristic looking microwave (also oddly designed), a coffee machine and the remains of a pizza box. In the sink were three unwashed mugs and a plate. The bedroom too was simply a little box room holding an unmade bed and a chest of drawers with a mirror.

It wasn't what you'd expect the home of a time-travelling, pyschokintetic hedgehog hero to look like.

Another thing that seemed to stand out (in Metal's opinion) was the lack of photographs around. There were no little selfie pictures framed on the side table or anything to suggest Silver had any friends at all. In fact there was only one photo which was hanging in front of the machine and that was a photo of an older female hedgehog formally posing with an extremely young Silver the Hedgehog who looked only a few months old. The female appeared to be a brown-orange colour and bore no resemblence to Silver at all. She had a very strained smile on her face and her eyes were tired.

Wonder what the story behind that photo was...

But there wasn't time to admire the decor. Metal Sonic soon turned his attention to searching the place for anything that might give him a clue as to where he could find the information he wanted. It was clear to him now that Silver probably kept things minimilistic and hid all his personal things just in case anyone came over. Time Travel clearly wasn't a common thing in the future and Silver was making sure to hide all evidence that he galavanted down the time stream every other night to see his inter-dimensional Fire Queen wife or to see his closest friends that were probably regarded as historical characters in _this_ day and age.

Searching the kitchen was pointless but the bedroom seemed a likely place for Silver to hide things so that was where Metal started, ransaking his drawers and feeling around for any hidden compartments. His search proved fruitful when he discovered an old shoe box stashed under a floor panel beneath the bed and pushed right to the back of the wall.

Opening the box, Metal Sonic stared down at the hundreds of photographs, big and small, of all Silver's friends back in the past. There were photos of Sonic, of Tails and Knuckles, of Amy and Cream, of Shadow, Rouge and Omega, of Vector, Espio, Charmy, of Shade and of Big and of Marine... and especially of Blaze. Nearly half the box were just pictures of Blaze, candid as well as posed. Some of the more recent ones included a glossy photo of Silver and Blaze on their wedding day back in the Sol Dimension and then another they had taken for their _second_ wedding reception which they apparently had put on specially for the friends that hadn't been able to travel through the dimensions the first time. Then there were photos of them on their honeymoon and...

Metal Sonic clutched the photograph carefully between his claws.

...a kitten. A newborn silver coloured kitten with a purple tipped tail. The messy writing that had been scribbled in pencil on the back read: _Steele. Miracle child. Premature at Aug 1st 2018. We don't know if we'll ever be able to have another..._

When Metal Knuckles had told him that the Sonic Allies were beginning to produce children, passing on their genes in creating miniature versions of themselves, he hadn't wanted to believe it. But that was nature - the animal kingdom constantly sought to secure their geneology by producing offspring which would carry their code and pass it on to the next descendent. It was sickening.

Metal allowed Sonic to believe that he didn't know anything about the existence of his future children. But the truth was he did. He knew very well what Sonic had done. As for what Amy Doll thought of it... Well, it was safe to say that she wasn't laughing about her own Inferior passing on her genes either.

However, as Metal had to keep reminding himself about, it was a matter for a later time. Right now, he was operating systematically and he soon resumed his first mission by entering the sitting room and finding out how to turn on the television.

The place looked like a secret hideout in many ways so perhaps there were agents who had secret methods of contacting Silver. There were no computers but there was the huge television which was full of channels that Metal Sonic hadn't heard of and each channel was full of programmes and series that were unfamiliar to him. Except for re-runs of that 'Kitchen of Chaos' show with Gordon the Ram. But this wasn't Metal's first time seeking out secrets and, sure enough, he eventually found an inconspicuous hidden 'channel' on the TV. There was nothing on it apart from a spinning grey logo in the shape of a spiked ball. Obviously, there was some kind of password needed but Metal Sonic wasn't in the mood to play around with it and, when desperate times called for desperate measures, sometimes the best way was the most direct one.

The window blind was pulled back with such force that it fell from the railing and light flooded the room which left Metal Sonic with his first look at the future.

The sky was a strange colour, a clear indication that pollution was still a severe issue and the city skyline had a constant thick cloud shrouding the tops of the very sleek and shiny skyscrapers. It was nearly, but not quite, the flashy visions of the future that people liked to fantasize about. Down below, walking in the streets, were tired looking Mobians going about their day to day business. The cars, which weren't exactly flying cars but seemed to glide over the ground without wheels, looked a little more futuristic in both shape and style. A couple of people were on motorised skateboards, and there were some questionable fashion choices but, other than that, there were a few similarities to Metal's own time to be seen.

Metal didn't have the patience to study something as mundane as appearances and, on another note, he rarely had the patience for doors: a window was much more practical.

* * *

A frazzled looking doe and her pint-sized fawn were turning down an empty street when a dark shadow descended on them and had knocked them both to the ground. There was no-one around to jump to their aid.

"What-?" the doe began to shriek and then found her voice failing her when she took in the sight of a very sinister looking robot shaped like a hedgehog. "What are you?"

Her son gripped her arms, his eyes bulging with fear. "It's the Hedgebot! The Hedgebot from Gramama's stories!" The legend of the evil Hedgebot was one that nearly every child knew. Metal Sonic had left an impression on the future in that he was now the dreaded 'Bogeyman' of terrified generations to come.

"**You WiLL tEll Me whaT I waNt to kNow**," Metal Sonic demanded, taking a step forward and further instilling faith in the young fawn that he was worthy of being feared.

"Please!" sobbed the doe, "No! Leave us alone! I beg you leave us alone!" She clutched at her son and hurriedly shuffled back so that she was against the wall. At once, a cold metal hand grabbed her face and pinned her mouth shut.

"**CeASe youR screAms anD no HarM shAll coMe to You or yOur offSPring**," he warned as he flashed his red optics. He only released the doe once she had miserably nodded her agreement to those wishes.

"Wh-what... What do you want?"

"**ThIs**." Metal brought up a hologram projection of the screen that had been on Silver's television showing the spinning grey logo. "**You knOw tHIs?**"

The doe glanced at it, shaking violently out of fear.

"... Peacespace?" she whimpered, "That's... That's a storage company. What do you want with them?"

"**WheRe is tHeir baSe**?"

"You mean their warehouse? Just outside of town. North. But they're no longer running. The company went bankrupt ages ago." She flinched as Metal suddenly disappeared, his business with the woman concluded.

Sure enough, just as the doe had said, the warehouse complex was situated on the fringes of the suburbs. It was quiet and looked empty but Metal suspected that was a front. True, according to Silver, the company that employed him were disbanded but that didn't mean they hadn't left some titbits behind for Metal Sonic to snap up. First things first: getting in.

There was one lone security guard stood outside looking rather cold and bored out of his skull. He looked up sharply when he heard the growl of Metal's engines.

"Who goes there?" he called into the air, readying his gun. "Hello?"

Unfortunately, he never found out who it was that killed him.

* * *

This had been the moment Dr Bryce Capella-Flynn had been dreading. The shadowed face of her superior wasn't one she enjoyed talking to on a good day, let alone a bad one.

"Yes Sir," she repeated to the screen, "Silver is not here."

"_Where is he?"_

She made sure her voice sounded steady.

"...Well, I would guess he's gone back in time again, Sir."

"_Back in...? Again? What do you mean, _again_?"_

"We, uh... We think he's been making frequent trips, Sir. But because he keeps returning to almost the same time he leaves, we've not noticed until recently. He's looking older all of a sudden."

Silver was a hedgehog that kept his distance from the science facility when it was possible. He wasn't exactly retired but he seemed to prefer not being ordered around and didn't appear to want to be tied down to their organisation which, when Dr Capella-Flynn thought about it, was fair enough. But that didn't mean Silver was a stranger to her and his sudden ageing hadn't gone unnoticed by anyone at Peacespace.

"_How long_?" her superior barked, his voice sounding angry, "_How long has he been visiting_?"

"Well, by our observations, he's looking like an adult, Sir. Mid to late twenties?"

"_So he's spent _years_ away_?" roared the voice over the line. "..._Where in time does he keep going_?"

"We're not sure on that. We've hardly had any time to study his tacheon particles..."

"_Find out where he keeps going and stop him! We need him here, young, fit and healthy! Not wasting his life back in the past! Search his house too! See if he's brought anything back with him - that'll give us a clue_."

"Yes Sir." She shut off the connection and leant back in her leather chair with a moan, taking off her ear piece and rubbing her gloved hands over her face.

"**I caN savE you THat trouBLe**."

Dr Capella-Flynn jumped and shot to her feet. The voice had sounded so warbled and false that she could have mistaken it as belonging to a robot...

She prevented herself from screaming as a blue coloured, hedgehog shaped robot stepped from his hiding place in the corner of the room. "

"Who are- _What_ are you?" And how had he got in without alerting security?

The robot's red eyes gleamed brighter.

"**I can Tell you WHere SILVER THE HEDGEHOG is aNd whAt he is doiNg**."

"You can?" With her finger in her pocket, she was in position to silently called for emergency backup once she'd assessed whether the robot was a threat or not. "Wait, you didn't answer my question."

"**My nAme is METAL SONIC**."

She was actually able to feel her heart skip a beat.

"As in... the famous badnik created by Dr Eggman over two centuries ago?"

"**JuSt as SILVER has jOurniEd to thE PAst**," Metal Sonic growled, "**so tOO havE I jourNied **_**fRom**_** thE pAst**."

Her fear and suspicion being replaced by excitement, Bryce gripped her chair.

"You're from the past?" she gasped, "Really? Then you know what Silver's doing?"

He had her where he wanted her.

"**He Has beEN liviNg a liFe sePErate FRom thiS timE**," he explained, "**He has mAny frieNds in My timE... and He haS a cHild**."

"He WHAT!?" Bryce clamped a hand over her mouth. Young Silver, _their _Silver, was a father? "Are you telling me he was able to reproduce in the past! That's incredible! We might be able to find a birth record of his offspring somewhere." Scientists had doubted whether Silver was capable of reproducing though they lived in hope that he could - if only to preserve the all-important Blue Chaos Born gene.

"**DouBTful**," Metal interrupted her eager thoughts, "**The moTheR of hiS chiLd is of ANother dimeNsion. BirtH recORds fOr his SOn will bE founD thERe. Not In thiS woRld**."

"...Drat!" Bryce hissed through her teeth, "There might have been a chance..." She broke off, suddenly remembering her present company.

Tiilting his head slightly, Metal Sonic picked up on her abrubt pausing.

"**A chanCe of whAT?"**

Narrowing her eyes, Dr Capella-Flynn gripped her pocketed handheld tighter.

"...Who exactly are you? Are you really THE Metal Sonic from all those old horror stories? Because there must be a damn good reason as to why you think I'll be willing to tell you anything if that's the case." She had only a second to let out a squeal when she felt cold claws press over her mouth as she stared into the sinister depths of Metal Sonic's computerised eyes.

"**I aM feeliNg grACiouS enOugh to oFfer you a TRade**." She could feel the slight vibrations as Metal spoke from his throat. "**I Will tell yOu wherE in timE SILVER liKEs to visiT and, iN retuRn, you sHall allOw me To accEss yoUr datA fileS**."

Trying to avoid having her lips cut off, Bryce was thankful when Metal removed his hand to allow her to speak. She was also thankful for still having a hand on her handheld and she used that moment to press the button.

"But I can't... What?"

"**This coMpany, PeacESpace**..." Metal said, "**WHat is yoUR staTus**?" He gripped the woman's throat again.

"AH! We are not... Peacespace disbanded. After Silver saved us from the Flames of Despair, we- we thought it would be safer -gah- to keep low profiles. The Followers of Robotnik would make Silver a target-"

"**What dO you mEan by tHe FlaMes of DespAir**?" Metal Sonic instantly asked, a dangerous _whirr_ sticking in his chest.

"A ferocious beast of fire!" Bryce winced, "It appeared out of nowhere, from a crack in the fabric of time and space. It threatened to destroy us all."

"**What waS its NAme? Was it CallEd IBLIS? SOLARIS**?"

"N-name? It had no name."

"**WAs it coNnecTed in aNY way tO SoleANna**?"

"The old city? What are you talking about? Soleanna City divided into two towns nearly a century ago. Why would they have anything to do with the Flames of Despair?"

"...**Then thaT timEline rEmaiNs eraSed**." Metal Sonic looked away briefly which gave Bryce time to look incredibly confused. But there wasn't time to think about when Metal returned his attention to her **"...I offereD yOu a DEal**."

"Get your hands off me!" shouted Bryce, struggling at last, "You know we might be disbanded, but there are still a handful of us around!"

It would have been tremendous timing on Bryce's part if, at that moment, the armed guards came bursting into the room with guns locked, loaded and pinned on the robot but, the truth was, they had to wait in awkward silence for about 30 more seconds before that happened.

Even then, it wasn't the thrilling rescue that was often seen in the films.

Metal Sonic, despite having no expressions to give, gave security an annoyed look and could have _tsked_ if he wanted to before dropping Bryce and making short work of the meddlesome guards, dashing from one to the next and leaving them unconscious, if not dead, behind him. The entire excersise only irritated Metal and when he returned to Bryce, he had no patience left.

"**A gReat shAMe**," he told her, gagging her with his hand again, "**If you haD alloWed me to LooK At youR filEs, I woulD havE GLadly toLd you whERe SILVER is and what He is dOing and wHO he is FriEnds with. I'm suRE you wOuld Have beEn inteRestEd to knoW that, woULdn't yoU?"**

Bryce moaned and made a furious noise but all that resulted in was her being tied to her chair with a rag in her mouth as Metal Sonic took control of her computer.

There on the screen spun the Peacespace logo and all it took was for Metal to plug himself in before the screen changed to a list of files ready to be accessed much to Bryce's horror.

With a computerised mind, Metal made a quick read of the files.

**"...genetic engineering, comparative genomic hybridisation, cytogenics, Fenton reactions**..." Metal continued on. "**Splicing - cutting out parts of the DNA and adding it to an organism. Cloning - creation of an organism that is genetically identicle to the original (desirable traits to be copied - link), GMOs - Genetically Modified Organism /genetic information manipulated to give different characteristics/"**

Finally, after his deep searching, Metal found the file he needed: a video log titled, _Project Silver_.

A middle-aged man was sat in front of the camera with a dishevelled, tired appearance but with a glint in his eyes that spoke of fear and anticipation. His name badge was obscured slightly so that all that could be seen of his name was _'Von Shlem'._ He was staring straight into the camera and spoke naturally, no sign of referring to notes at all.

"_Well over 2 centuries ago_," he was saying, "_scientists made it their mission to create ultimate life. For some, it was to be used to enhance our knowledge of medicine in the hopes that we could live longer and stronger. Others, however, saw the creation of ultimate life as a weapon. An army of these super-soldiers could almost guarantee total domination of not only our planet, but that of any other planet harbouring life out in the cosmos. The work of Professor Gerald Robotnik and his team was a success. They completed Project Shadow and birthed the Ultimate Lifeform, a creature capable of extreme strength and endurance with the powers of Chaos at its disposal. Recognising the danger of such a lifeform, the G.U.N. made it their mission to wipe out all trace of Project Shadow and, in this, they were just as successful. The fate of Shadow, Professor Robotnik's 'Ultimate Lifeform' is unknown and his whereabouts were kept a mystery. _

_With this message, I hope to have it recorded for future history that we, once again, in the absence of any data left over from Project Shadow, have created ultimate life. _

_We live in dark times. Poverty and disease threaten us all and our resources are near depleted. In our time of oppression - oppression from criminal forces, from ancient evils, from the followers of The Eggman, from the hostile aliens of other planets - we have turned to one hope; to once again create an Ultimate LIfeform to save us and to protect us. It is my dream that this, our silver lining on the storm cloud, can bring us hope. _

_Thus, Project Silver is a success. Without the inclusion of the Black Arms Species but still retaining the original hedgehog DNA, we have spliced together another GMO, one capable of psychokinetic power. We have, however, taken a risky precaution. The original subject for the project, the only hedgehog baby to be found in all the orphanages we searched, died from suspected Cot Death but we've made a breakthrough in the science community in taking this infant hoglet, our silver lining, and altering his genetics, infusing it with the original Chaos Born DNA and actually resurrecting a completely new being! Hedgehogs are a dying species and we have little time to look for another so I pray that those hearing these words understand how our desperation moved us to use the remains of a child to create our future. Of course, we have named him Silver. _

_Arrangements have been made to keep Silver under the care of either a suitable surrogate mother or an orphanage caretaker to raise him. This may be our undoing but I strongly feel that this inclusion of moral standards will prove that this is not an Ultimate Lifeform to be feared but, rather, to be hopeful for. Perhaps the fact that Silver was born an ordinary hedgehog might persuade authorities that he is to be trusted and not to be treated as Project Shadow was once treated. It would be wise to withold the knowledge that Silver was born from a dead body. Like a true phoenix._

_This has to work. Our new modified Ultimate Lifeform must be our silver lining. The original DNA sample that Professor Gerald Robotnik took for the creation of Project Shadow will not last much longer and we do not know what became of the Chaos Born hedgehog or of his decendents. As I have repetedly said, there are few hedgehogs left - they are critically endangered, fewer than twenty! And of the precious few that we have tested, not one holds the dormant Blue Gene that was so crucial to the creation of Shadow and Silver. It __must__ be the original DNA. We have tried and failed to preserve DNA samples taken from Silver; the gene-sequence is not viable. Our young GMO is still being raised and we wait until he is of proper age before we test his abilities and to see if the Chaos Born's DNA has successfully fused with his own. If Project Silver fails, then our chances fail with him. This is our final hope for the future. _

_Perhaps Project Silver and, should he still exist, Project Shadow... perhaps they can lead this world to peace. And perhaps, through them, the legacy of the Chaos Born will be remembered forever_."

The video ended and went static.

Metal Sonic's mind swam with new information, processing it into new storage files.

"**It maY intEreST you tO knoW**," he said over his shoulder, "**that SILVER THE HEDGEHOG has yEt to fatHer a**_** HedgeHog **_**chilD. His soN is Of the Cat SPecies, like ITs moTher. You Will reciEve no**_** 'BluE GeNe' **_**frOm the likEs of hiM**."

Of course Dr Capella-Flynn couldn't reply but she did struggle.

"**I wAs rigHt**," the robot continued to himself, "**If I deSTroy SONIC... theN SHADOW and SILVER wilL cEaSe to exiSt. If thE LeGacy of the ChaOS BoRn IS to SUrvivE, it SHall survIve thRoUgh **_**me**_**.**"

Bryce stopped and listened with growing amazement, daring to believe what the robot was muttering to himself.

"**There can only be one SONIC**."


	10. Lost Treasures Found

Bobbing up and down went Vector's motorboat over the waves some 40 to 60 miles off from the Emerald Coast. They had shut off the motor and were just having a drift for a little bit while Vector read his book and Charmy sat at the prow with a fishing line. His music player was beside him but it had run out of battery life an hour ago so the bee, now a full 20 years old, had resorted to singing his own tunes.

"_1, 2, 3, 4, 5_," he sang, "_Once I caught a fish a-live. 6, 7, 8, 9, 10. Then I let it go a-gain_." He paused for a second to see if Vector would say anything but he didn't. "_Why did you let it go? Be-cause it bit my fin-ger so. Which fin-ger did it bite? ... This little finger on my right_!"

"I'll bite more than jus' yer finger."

There was the complaint that Charmy had been waiting for. 20 years wasn't really enough time for Charmy to 'mature'.

"You know, Vec," he sighed, inhaliing the sea air, "I was kinda hoping we'd go fishing on a lake or something. What am I going to catch way out here in the ocean?"

"We ain't after the little lake fish, Charmy. We're here fer a REAL feast," Vector licked his teeth. "Maybe a Marlin or something. A fish that'll knock Espio off his feet when he gets back."

Charmy glanced doubtfully at his little fishing line.

"With this, I'd call myself talented if I was able to catch an old boot. Probably should've brought a net or, you know, an experienced, real-life, fisherman."

Two years ago, the Chaotix had discovered a jungle tribe way out in the East while they were on the trail of a bandit. The tribe had been a little community of mostly chameleons like Espio but a family of geckos and a salamander had been accepted among them it seemed. Once the Chaotix had helped them with a particularly stressful fight with a rival tribe of snakes, they were given assured friendship and hospitality. One of the Tribe maidens had taken a liking to Espio and had requested that the Matriarch of the Tribe agree that he be allowed to stay if he so wished.

Espio had agreed to stay and help but only for a little while - his first duty was to the Chaotix and to his place as one of the Sonic Allies.

"He sure is taking his sweet time over in the jungles, isn't he?" Charmy commented and he could sense the toothy grin on Vector's face.

"Ah, ya know why THAT is."

Charmy cleared his throat and mimiced the voice of the maiden.

"'Oh, thank you for helping to save my people, brave warrior. You're so quick and nimble! I'm falling for you hard!'"

"Naw, Charmy," Vector tutted, "she didn't say that exactly."

"Nah, it was something subtle like 'Won't you stay and teach your skills to our inexperienced soldiers so we aren't left defenceless?' but she said it with a ton of hidden subtext which was something along the lines of 'Can you stay so I can make out with you up in my treehouse shack? Also, marry me.'"

The two of them laughed very loudly out on the open sea, where no-one but the gulls were around to hear them.

"Well, he's a good looking guy so you couldn't exactly blame the lady," Vector pointed out.

"Don't reckon Esp was all that interested anyway," Charmy shrugged, "Jungles are great and all but there aren't many mysteries to be solved there."

"Even Detectives retire eventually."

"Ha! Yeah right! Knowing you, Vec, you'll be a least a hundred- AH!" Charmy cried as he bumped his music player off the side and watched it go _plunk_ into the water. "My music player!"

"Well that's gone and done it," Vector grumbled, standing up and coming over to stand next to the bee. "Smooth work, Charmy."

"Wait, no!" Charmy went on, "Tails made it waterproof! It should be okay, if I can just get it back."

"Charmy..."

"It's got, like, five thousand songs on there!" Charmy pleaded. "It's got your playlist and everything! You know how long it will take for me to get all that back?" He wasn't a kid anymore, that was for sure, but some of his baby boyish cuteness had still carried over nad Charmy could summon it at a moment of his choosing.

Vector rolled his eyes. He was an older croc now, pushing 35 years into his prime of life, which meant that he was at peak performance as far as lifespans were concerned.

"...Yer lucky I'm feeling in the mood for a swim. Be warned though, I can only dive to a certain depth, you got it?"

Without waiting for a response, Vector stripped off his jacket, chain necklace and headphones before he dived into the cool water and disappeared from view with a few swishes of his thick tail, leaving behind a string of tiny air bubbles which Charmy tried to follow for as long as possible.

He sat there and waited and waited and waited, eventually glancing up at the morning sun to check the progression of time. It was about 10:00 in the morning.

After a while, the water stirred a little distance from the boat and a green scaly head popped through the surface, missing the boat by about four meters.

"Did you get it?" Charmy called as Vector came swimming over to him.

Grabbing the side of the boat, Vector held out his clawed hand. "Here."

"You're the best Vector!" Charmy grinned after thanking him, "The absoulte best!"

"Yeah, yeah, I know." Vector hadn't climbed back into the boat. He remained where was in the water with one hand still clutching the side and the rest of him turned back out towards the open sea.

"...What's the matter?" asked Charmy.

"There was somethin' down there," Vector told him, "Looked... like something of Eggman's."

"...A 'currently in use' sorta something or an old kinda something?"

"Old. And big. Pretty sure it was a warship."

"A warship!?" Charmy's eyes widened. They hadn't had to deal with any of Eggman's warships in years! Not since Charmy was a pre-teen anyway.

"...Back to base, Charmy," Vector suddenly barked, pulling himself up onto the boat with a simple flex of his shoulders. "We're gonna suit up and come back to scope this thing out."

"You got it, Boss."

When Vector and Charmy returned to the area an hour later, now kitted out in their diving gear, they made sure to anchor the boat before diving down in the area that Vector had previously swam. Down, down, they dove, the water so clear at first but growing darker as they swam further from the sunny surface. Even down on the ocean floor, there was still plenty of light to see by but, living up to its name, the water of Emerald Coast was now a dim green colour.

Charmy paused in mid-paddle as a large ominous shape appeared in front of him and he stared in absolute shock as Vector continued on, fearlessly leading the way.

"Woah," Vector heard Charmy whistle over their built-in communicators, "You weren't kidding. THAT'S what I call a warship..." Charmy kicked his legs and swam closer, drawing up beside Vector as he squinted forward to read the writing on the hull of the ship. "'The Egg Carrier'..."

With a strong flick of his tail, Vector positioned himself directly above the wreckage.

"I'm sure I've seen somethin' like this in a picture."

"Maybe Sonic will know," Charmy suggested, peeking his head in through a large hole that had torn the port side.

"I'd stake my entire fortune on Sonic knowin'," Vector grunted, already taking pictures with his underwater camera.

The two detectives split up, swimming in different directions to scope out the ship quicker. Charmy swam in through the hole while Vector did a slow examination of the outside and the debris around on the seabed. The bee, now tall and slender (though not quite as tall as Vector), was able to wriggle through other holes in the side and discover room after room of flooded warship as well as all the fish and other aquatic creatures that had made the sunken warship their home. He even found the remains of Eggman's old chair in the main control room all covered in barnacles and starfish and, just to make his sentiments know, gave it as strong a kick as he could despite the water hindering his power.

"Yo, Vec?" Charmy said as he stuck his head through another hole which lead back outside, "This thing hasn't been used in years. Look at it."

Vector was up on what would have been the deck, examining the pipes.

"I am," he replied as Charmy came swimming up. He pointed to the metal pipes. "And it's pretty clear that a whole heap of fightin' was going on around here. See that? Them grooves in the metal? These dings?" Sure enough, in the metal were deep scratches and several tears. "Classic signs of one Sonic T. Hedgehog." His eyes looked beyond the pipes towards another piece of ship where the metal had warped and bent. His keen detective mind was quick to pick out a familiar mark in the ground; a wide dent with two puncture holes. "Well, well, well... Knuckles too, huh? Well where's there's a Sonic and a Knuckles..." Vector ran his hand over a scorch mark on the metal, "...there's usually a Tails."

Charmy kicked his legs and turned around in a circle.

"There's nothing of this place. Just dead beat robot remains," he said.

Vector didn't say anything. He was lost in his own thoughts, thousands of theories coursing through his crocodile brain as he slowly swam back and forth, looking at his pictures, looking at the wreckage, looking at the remains of robot pieces that were scattered around the area, looking at one robot shell that was still relatively intact...

"...Vec?" Charmy called to him softly, "Yo, Vector, watcha thinking?"

"I'm thinkin'," replied Vector, "there's somethin' 'bout this that I oughta know."

"What kinda something?"

"Somethin' Amy was sayin'. Yer remember when we were round Knuckles' place when Ruby was born?"

"Yeah I remember."

"They started talkin' 'bout Chaos."

"Oh yeah! The watery monster thing that was sealed inside the Master Emerald. What's that got to do with this?"

"Nothin' much." Vector was hovering over the beat up robot with the giant hole in it which, other than that, had kept in pretty good shape. "'Cept that Amy kept mentionin' a robot that, apparently was a lot like ol' Omega. I'm wonderin' if that's what these robots are."

"Robots like Omega?" Charmy frowned, looking around him. One or two of the robots did have a similar resemblance to Omega, that was true, but unless it was the erosion of the sea that was playing tricks with him, Charmy thought that these robots looked a little taller and more slender. "But wouldn't Egghead have kept these? He had a load of old robots back in his place on Christmas Isle before Ira Robotnik blew the place sky high."

"Maybe the Warship went down before he could do that." Vector shrugged. "I'm just puttin' clues together here. Like the fact that we're not far from the Emerald Coast which borders Station Square which was targetted by Perfect Chaos..." It was as though voicing that had made Vector come to a decision. "Charmy," he barked as he bent down and lifted the dead robot, "give us a hand with this."

* * *

Blinking hard to shake the exhaustion, Silver had spent the last 3 hours fighting sleep. Metal Knuckles, Tails Doll and Amy Doll had left him alone though what they were doing was unknown which meant that Silver wasn't in any hurry to fall asleep and drop his guard.

The dripping sound in the background wasn't soothing, it was irritating. And the wind howling sounded ominous, not cosy. Silver wasn't sure how long he'd be kept here, listening to the tunnel sounds, awaiting torment from Amy Doll to allow Metal Sonic to return and threaten his friends' safety.

Eyes heavy and face dropping into the fur of his chest, Silver yawned very loudly.

"Attractive," whispered a voice.

Silver's head shot up and he looked around warily. He could almost swear that the voice had sounded just like Sonic the-

"_Sonic_?" Silver hissed under his breath as a blue hedgehog crawled out from under a stack of crates, slinking over the ground on all fours like a wild animal and slipping behind his chair in one swift movement.

"Shhh!" Sonic hissed back, pulling out a couple of loose quills from his back in order to pick Silver's locks (it was a trick that the hedgehogs had learnt recently).

"Please tell me you have backup," Silver whispered, fearfully searching the shadows for any signs of the robotic monstrosities, or better - the familiar face of a friend.

He heard Sonic discretely cough behind him as he went fiddling with the metal clamps. "Uh... Well, there's Big. He's about 50 miles southwest of here."

"Sonic..."

"Save it for now, buddy." Sonic reached over and patted Silver's shoulder. "We've got to get you out of here as soon as possible." Sonic could see the state he was in - Silver's fur was slick and dirty and some of his quills had fallen out from stress. His eyes were bloodshot and his lips looked dry. Then there was the gash on his head which had matted the fur and quills with clotted blood. A dried blood streak ran from the wound down the side of Silver's face and had spotted his shoulder with red dots.

Whether it was relief at being rescued or fear of what might happen, Silver's eyes began to water. "Metal Sonic isn't here," he whimpered.

Sonic grit his teeth and nodded. "That's what I'm counting on."

"He's gone forward in time," Silver went on whispering, gasping for breath as he mentally walked himself through the steps to avoid a panic attack. "To the future."

The frown on Sonic's face grew. "When's he due back?"

"Less than fifteen minutes," replied Silver, his hands trembling, "Amy Doll will be here before then."

Ears immediately pricking, Sonic looked up sharply. "...Amy Doll? I thought all the Amy Dolls were... " He shook his head. "Never mind. We can be gone in ten minutes."

"Gone?"

"Silver, do you know how hard it is to keep my location a secret from Metal?" Sonic said, moving into Silver's line of sight, "If he comes back and I'm sitll here, he's gonna know about it. Unless I put a great deal of effort into clearing my mind and, with you here and in the state you're in, I don't know if I'll be able to concentrate on doing that for very long, he's going to be on my tail the second he arrives."

"Don't you wanna know what he's doing?" Silver pressed, "What his plan is?"

Sonic looked at Silver's sorry state again and sighed. "...Right now, pal, you're more important."

Silver took a shaky breath. "...What if _I_ want to know what he's doing? He went to the future to get information about _me_."

"What?" Sonic gasped as quietly as he could, his ears fixed on listening for the approach of something robotic. "Why?"

"I don't know." Silver shook his head miserably. "They won't tell me."

Sonic gnawed his lip. "The area outside is full of radiation," he told him, "You're in the middle of an old Eggman power station. I mananged to get this far with the help of a little Chaos Energy and by finding the opening of this tunnel in good time but I'll have to run extra fast if I want to get us both out of here."

"Please, Sonic," Silver squeaked, "I have to know what he's doing."

"We'll find out eventually. Blaze has been worried sick about you and Steele-"

"'Eventually' might be too late." Silver looked over Sonic's shoulders, worry etched in his eyes. "...These robots..." he gulped, "they hate their organic counterparts. They call you their Inferiors. If we don't find out what they're going to do then you four are in serious trouble. Again."

Sonic thought back to his previous long-distance conversation with Metal and how he had made him promise not to include anyone other than was nessessary. Before, that had meant just he, Tails and Knuckles. If Amy Doll was now on the scene...

"...Why would Metal Sonic need information about you if he wants to get to me?" Sonic asked, his voice sharpening more than it should of at the thought of what he would do if one of those robots so much as looked in Amy's direction.

"That's what I'm saying," Silver insisted, "Leave me here so I can find out."

Shaking his head, Sonic brought himself back to the present and remembered he had the welfare of his other friends on his hands as well as Amy's. "I'm not leaving you alone, Silver. No way."

"You can't stay here..."

Simultantiously, both hedeghogs' ears twitched in the same direction as they heard something quietly clang in the echoing distance. It could only mean that one of the robots would be coming their way.

Sonic spat a curse under his breath and went back to work trying to fiddle with the locks. He would have tried using one of his more traditional methods for freeing Silver but he didn't want to risk hurting his friend or alerting the enemy that he was there.

"Sonic, no!" Silver protested with a moan, "Metal will find you! Go!"

Sonic might have ignored the warning had his sharp hearing and sense of smell not warned him of the imminent approach of a Team Metal member. So he flattened his ears but rather than dash away to safety, instead retreated back to his hiding place off to the side before Silver had time to protest against his decision to stay on the scene.

Especially since Amy Doll was now nearby and quickly appeared into Silver's line of sight.

"**Are yoU talkiNg to mE**?" she asked sweetly.

Silver tried keeping the same tone of voice he had used before.

"...Uh... Go!" he shouted. "Leave me alone!"

"**No**," Amy Doll said, shaking her head, "**We hAve to briNG METAL SONIC baCk hOme."**

There was no sign of Metal Knuckles or the Tails Doll and that worried both Silver and Sonic, watching the scene in front of him wishing he could just break the Amy Doll and rush off with Silver in tow but if there was one thing that Silver valued, it was knowing your enemy's motives. Silver had spent much of his naive youth being looked after by the likes of Blaze and Sonic and the others which had shaped him into a much more responsible adult.

That wasn't to say that there wasn't still a child-like innocence to him and when Amy Doll tormented him enough to make contact with the future, Sonic had to press his eyes shut and block out the sounds of Silver's cries. He could feel the chaos energy inside him flaring up and burning his veins, just as it did whenever he turned into Super Sonic.

Only there weren't enough Chaos Emeralds to acheive a Super state which meant that the only form Sonic could possibly have taken was the one acheived by negative emotions... the dangerous form that Sonic had sworn to never ever use again unless the situation called for it.

Taking slow breaths, Sonic was thankful when Silver stopped screaming but now had to concentrate even more when the portal opened and his metal counterpart emerged from the future.

It had been years since Sonic last saw Metal Sonic so he almost couldn't afford to look, for fear that he would lose his grip on what kept him hidden.


	11. Scrapped Metal

**What with all the speculation and theories going on for the Sonic Movie next year, it's been interesting to see how my own theories and head canons fit into it. So far, it's pretty similar!**

* * *

Metal Sonic stepped into the tunnel and shook himself, casting a commanding glance around to look at Silver.

"**WeLcomE bAck, METAL SONIC**," chirped the Amy Doll, pattering over and touching the robot hedgehog with her antennae.

Sonic couldn't remember the last time he'd dealt with an Amy Doll but he _could_ remember the feel of her strong grip as she tightened her arms around your limbs. She was small but that only served to make her more terrifying - just like Tails Doll.

"...**QuiTe a homE You have, SILVER THE HEDGEHOG**," Metal Sonic spoke to Silver.

Silver, still shaking from the Amy Doll, glared at him from under his eyelids.

"You better have left everything the way you found it," he snarled. It wasn't the tone of voice one normally associated with Silver. It was a 'Shadow' tone.

Metal Sonic almost appeared amused by this as he wafted his claws in Silver's direction, turning to Amy Doll isntead.

"**I have bEen aBLe to aqUire the DAta nesseSsaRy to our oBjectivEs**," he said to her, "**The deADlock files oN the GUN databAse werE correCt**."

"What are you talking about?" Silver asked instantly, "What files? What... what 'data' have you found?"

A few seconds passed in which only Amy Doll's chittering could be heard as she clung to Metal Sonic's ankle, comfortably sat on his red plated foot.

In response to Silver's question, Metal gave a cryptic answer:

"...**It doEs nOt matteR if one BelieveS that SONIC THE HEDGEHOG was boRn of ChaOs or not. All thaT maTters is tHAt some bElievEd he Was the firST key In unlOCking ulTimAte liFe**."

Upon hearing the seemingly random reply, Silver cocked a quizzical eyebrow.

"...Oookay..."

Hidden from sight, Sonic was listening with a tremble beginning to grow in his legs as he heard his metal rival discuss him in such a way.

"**TIme trAvel was THe answER**," the robot went on, "**The pAst anD the futURe are cOnneCTed by oNe tHing**."

Silver rolled his eyes. "...I'm going to go out on a limb and buzz my answer in as 'the present'?"

"**CorrEct. CuRRent eveNts**."

"Ah, you see that depends." Sonic had apparently instilled some sort of confidence in Silver by coming to his rescue because the pyschokintetic hedgehog was feeling more like himself. "I mean, where I live, THAT is what I know as the present. Right now, I consider myself as being in the past. 'The Present' just refers to the period of time you're living in and 'The Past' and 'The Future' are the just the periods of time that surround you as an individual." He grinned cheekily. At this rate, he might be able to clear his mind enough to use his psychokinesis again.

Metal's cold gaze, however, soon chilled any form of victory that Silver was feeling.

"...**FoOlisHly, you HAve misTakEn mE foR soMEonE who aSkeD for Your oPInion**."

Silver pursed his lips and bowed his head.

"...Ok, the way you said that sounded really cool..."

**"AnD for aNOther thiNg, I conSider 'The Present' to be wherever SONIC is," **Metal continued, "**YOu arE 'The FutUre'. SHADOW is 'The Past'**."

"Why do you lump us together?" asked Silver, frowning once more, "Just because we're all hedgehogs and we all look the same - if you ignore the obvious fur colour and spine style differences - doesn't mean we need to be banded together as a group."

"**What ConnecTs the paSt anD the fUture**?"

"You already asked me that..."

Then all at once it hit Silver. He immediaetly mentally transported himself back in time to four years ago, when he and the others were patiently waiting in a hospital for Sonic to be discharged. He remembered Shadow and Omega walking up to him, Omega handing Shadow a set of files and leaving, Shadow giving Silver a look that made his stomach drop...

In an Eggman facility on Christmas Isle, Shadow and Omega had found hinting evidence that Sonic, since birth, had been targetted by the Robotnik family for a purpose none of them were sure about. According to some old sketchy letters, there were suggestions that DNA from Sonic had been taken and stored for future use.

And '_future_ use' only meant one thing...

The paler hedgehog opened his mouth and laughed.

"Ha! Wait, you went all the way...?" He shook his head. "The hard copy evidence of anything that even _remotely _suggests of my geneology was destroyed years ago."

Sonic didn't know about the information concerning his DNA and both Shadow and Silver had agreed not to tell him about it. Silver prayed that Sonic wouldn't guess anything based on what Metal was saying.

"**I diDn't go looKing foR 'harD coPies'**," Metal growled, "**I wenT tO loOK for diGitAl conFIrmaTion and I fOuNd it. All YOur bioLogical inForMAtion waS there For anyoNe to rEad**."

The laughter died out and Silver's eyes lost their merriment. Mouth folding into a grimace, he looked up into the eyes of Metal Sonic.

"**Tell mE, thouGh**," Metal said softly, "**why Were thoSE 'hard cOpy' fileS deSTroYed**?"

Silver put in a great amount of effort into not turning in the direction Sonic had hidden.

"We didn't want to know," he mumbled, "We prefer considering ourselves as seperate _unique_ hedgehogs who don't owe our existances to anyone but ourselves."

What he didn't say was that he and Shadow had already had a sneak peak at those files - something that Sonic hadn't done - and they were 80% sure that their genetic makeup was mostly from their blue speedy friend. Hence why Shadow and Silver were tuned into the powers of Chaos and why they all shared the same facial structure.

"**You werEn't evEn curiOuS**?"

"...Maybe Shadow and I were at first. But I'm glad Sonic destroyed those files. And we're not dumb enough to believe everything Eggman says if he tries to tell us what we don't want to know."

**"Then YOu are haPPy to diE not kNowiNg whO you Are."**

The hedgehog glared at him. "I'm Silver."

Metal Sonic didn't have a mouth but, if he had, it would be showcasing a smile.

"**That's fiNe. You'Re SILVER. JUst SILVER**."

"That's right," Silver nodded, recalling what Sonic had once said to him. "I'm not Shadow and I'm not Sonic. I'm Silver."

Metal then made a strange noise. Almost like a robotic grunt.

**"...No, yoU aRe Not SONIC. Not **_**coMpleTely**_** SONIC... If you WEre him tHen I'd... ... ..."**

His voice trailed away and Metal lifted his head, no longer giving Silver his attention. The red in his optics grew and flickered dangerously as something in his head began to _whirrrrrrr -click- grrrrrrrrrrrr -click-_.

"You'd what? Eh?" Silver didn't like the way Metal was looking. It frightened him. "Hello? Don't leave me on a cliffhanger."

But Metal Sonic wouldn't say anything. Amy Doll made a squeaking noise and hopped off his foot, aware that something was now aggitating her commander.

"All right then, we're playing this game," Silver said awkwardly, swallowing his fear. "If I were Sonic, you'd... let me guess... throttle me? Skin me alive? Throw me into space? ... I'm guessing it would involve your hand and my throat in some way. ... I expect a heavy amount of glaring... Of course, I would be the one making a wise-crack comment probably... hey! Where are you going?"

Metal had turned his head to one side and, twitching his optics, took a step away in the direction of Sonic's hiding place.

Just for a moment, a split moment, Metal Sonic had felt a trace of Sonic somewhere nearby and it caused every system in his body to flare into aggressive life.

Amy Doll was given a private message to retreat and contact Metal Knuckles and Tails Doll who, unbeknown to Silver, had left on another mission. So she twittered a noise and scarpered off into the darkness.

"What's going on?" Silver asked, growing more and more worried as he now realised that Metal must have sensed Sonic.

Sure enough, that's precisely what was happening.

"_**Where are you, Sonic? I can feel you**__."_

On and on went the dripping noise and the wind seemed to roar a little louder outside.

_"I've been looking for you."_

A jolt went through Metal, be it excitement or loathing.

_"__**You've managed to hide your location from me. Afraid?**__"_

_"Just wanted to talk. There's been a hilarious mix-up. You see, you left a battle with one of my friends._"

"What are you doing?" Silver asked again, pulling at his wrist clamps.

"_**Did that upset you then?"**_

_"Well, were you planning on returning him?"_

_"__**What would be the point of that? I was hoping to personally reunite you later**__."_

Silence.

_"...Don't bother."_

Metal Sonic was sent flying and found himself creating a robot hedgehog shaped dent in the tunnel wall some meters behind him. Silver gave a yell out of fright but quickly replaced it with a cry of encouragement when Sonic slid to a stop in front of him having spin dashed his enemy with as much force in as little time as possible.

There was no time for conversation and Sonic wasn't going to let Metal get the upper hand on him. He wasn't here to have a drawn out fight with the robot or see to it that it was destroyed, instead he was prioritising Silver's rescue over his own instinct to dismantle Metal there and then.

That meant not giving Metal the chance to retaliate.

Metal was pummelled deeper into the wall as Sonic resumed his relentless attack, spin dashing him over and over again until he began to feel his quills rip through Metal Sonic's armour. Kicking with his feet, Sonic bounced from Metal to Silver, resuming his previous task of trying to free him as Metal was left sparking and screeching from the crevice in the wall.

There was an additional shriek of rage as the Amy Doll came to Metal Sonic's rescue, bounding from the shadows and making a bee-line for Sonic with every intention of seizing him and blowing him up.

"Sonic, watch it!" Silver called out. Not that he thought Sonic was unaware of Amy Doll but he was feeling a lot of pent up adrenaline at that point in time and he needed a suitable outlet for it.

Darting from danger just in time, Sonic threw a few more spin dashes at Metal to make sure he hadn't tried to recuperate before swinging round in an attempt to kick at Amy Doll.

Silver refrained from pulling and struggling, reasoning that his best chance at escape would be if he was able to calm his mind long enough to summon his psychokinetic powers to help him. Amy Doll's dealings with him had rendered his mental state unable to use his power for a while but this was a situation which wouldn't wait around for something like that.

Amy Doll gave a high pitched wail as Sonic's foot connected with something hard in her torso and sent her spinning through the air and through a computer which exploded in a shower of sparks.

Before Sonic could hurry back to Silver, he discovered he'd left Metal alone too long when he felt a cold hand grab his bicep and yank him backwards so that he fell. He'd only bounced painfully off the ground once before he was pulled up and punched straight in the chest which caused him to end up in a position similar to the Amy Doll; deep inside the remains of a now-thrashed computer. Sonic barely had time to comprehend the fact that he was getting moderately shocked by the computer before Metal was on him again, pulling him from the wreckage by his throat and drawing his claws upwards in a slice, catching Sonic in the stomach. He probably would have thrown Sonic again had the hedgehog not decided he'd had enough of the mistreatment.

Metal had a second to register Sonic's legs around his neck and then another second to register the floor he now had his face smashed into.

"That hurt me a lot more than it hurt you!" he heard Sonic say in his usual cocky way.

"_**Shut up! Shut up**__!_" Metal uncharacteristically screamed in his head.

With another sharp and very powerful kick, Sonic sent Metal in the direction he'd last seen the Amy Doll and then, ignoring the sting in his tummy, prepared to return to Silver.

Metal wasn't having it. He charged up his chest canon and sent a shot accross the room, destroying everything in its path and narrowly missing Silver by a foot! Sonic had to call upon his legendary reflexes to jump away in time to avoid being barbecued.

That was when a large slab from the ceiling began to glow blue and, with a cry from Silver, it dropped from above and buried the computer right on top of the heads of Metal Sonic and Amy Doll.

The psychokinetic power surge had blown Silver's bonds apart and the futuristic hedgehog was free besides being utterly exhausted.

"That's our cue, pal," Silver heard Sonic say in his ear but, with his eyes pressed shut to settle his pounding head, couldn't quite remember anything more other than the feeling of Sonic's arms around him, pulling him off his feet. Sonic was still talking to him gently as his head lolled over onto Sonic's chest. "It's okay, buddy. That's it, lean on me. You're okay. Hey? Don't fall asleep, Silver lad. Stay with me. I'm gonna get you out of here. Atta boy!"

Then he felt the rush of the cool wind against him which only conjured one last thought in his head - Sonic had started to run.

* * *

"**Return now**?" Metal Knuckles questioned, "**When we are so close**?"

Hovering in the air, he could spy Angel Island's beautiful landscape below him as he, with the Tails Doll, kept themselves hidden above the clouds. He had been trying to sense his Inferior but since he was having difficulty in this department, he could only conclude that Knuckles was back on his home island where the Master Emerald protected him.

Cursed lump of stone.

Now they had got a message from Amy Doll requesting that they return.

"**If Metal Sonic believes Sonic is there-ere/././**," Tails Doll was chirping from his shoulder, "**then we must return**."

"**Acknowledged**," Metal Knuckles replied, "**but my Inferior is down there. I have seen Team Dark down there too**."

"**And Knuckles' offspring?" **

Metal Knuckles growled. "**And the offspring**."

Their mission had been simple - find Angel Island and calculate the possibility of taking the Master Emerald. Victory was assured if their enemies had no way of accessing greater power such as the Chaos Emeralds or the Master Emerald. The Master Emerald also had a nasty habit of warning Knuckles to danger and Metal Knuckles didn't want his Inferior to know that he had marked him for termination.

"**Metal Sonic's order takes prioriiiiity/" **Tails Doll squeaked, flopping his head back and forth.

"**Ackowledged**," Metal Knuckles repeated, "**Then we will return**-"

"_**Return! Return to me**__!"_ screeched Metal Sonic's voice in their internal communicators. "_**Sonic is here. We're under attack**__._"

Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll weren't the sort to take a moment to exchange glances. They turned and flew back towards their base at high speed already prepared for battle.

What they discovered was the remains of their former hideout. Most of the tunnel walls had collpased and none of the computers had survived. Where Silver had been there was now an empty chair.

From under a large slab of metal ceiling came a frantic squealing and a fairly burnt Amy Doll came wriggling out, scrabbling at the littered ground as she tried to free herself. Catching sight of her two teammates, she let out another squeal, gesturing wildly to the slab.

As Tails Doll pulled at Amy Doll's felt hand, Metal Knuckles tucked his enormous claws under the slab and heaved it up, revealing a fizzing Metal Sonic lying on his back, glaring up with hate-filled optics.

No-one spoke but everyone was in agreement of what their situation was now.

They'd lost Silver, Sonic had slipped through their fingers and now their enemies would be more alert for attacks. Metal Sonic's consolation was that he'd still managed to achieve his task and it was a step forward in achieving his goals but before he could check off the next thing on his to-do list, he'd have to repair himself.

Or rather, someone else would.


	12. Safe and Sound - Sort of

From the sofa, Blaze looked up as she turned and her eyes grew upon catching sight of a very sorry looking Silver shuffling into the room with Sonic behind him, ready to offer support if it was needed.

"Silver!" Blaze cried, her book dropping from her fingers. "Oh my- Silver! You're safe!" In an instant, she was up on her feet and had vaulted the back of the sofa, darting over and taking him by his shoulders as she hugged him.

Without saying anything, Silver wrapped his arms around her and inhaled her lavender fur, comforted beyond all relief and feeling his cares melt away when Blaze, overcome with emotion, began to very softly purr so that only Silver could feel it as his fur became moist against the cat's happy tears of relief.

It only took Amy a second to make it from the kitchen to the sitting room and another half a second to comprehend the scene. Feeling choked up, she looked between the embracing couple and her own husband.

"...What on earth happened?" she asked Sonic, her heart thumping as she realised what he must have done. "You were supposed to _find_ Silver."

"And I did," Sonic quietly nodded, not brave enough to make eye contact with her. He gestured limply with his right hand. "Here he is."

Wiping away her tears and sniffing, Blaze pulled out of Silver's chest and put her paws on his face, holding his head and staring into his eyes.

"Are you okay?" she asked him, "You're not hurt are you?"

Silver smiled.

"Nothing a little rest won't cure," he told her. He'd asked to stop by a body of water on the way so that he could clean his fur of blood before being reunited with his family. Blaze's fingers were only a couple of centimeteres away from the cut on his head and he knew he'd have to tell her about it eventually but, for now, he wanted nothing more than to put her at ease.

"I'll let the others know," Amy began and then, for the first time, noticed who had gingerly tiptoed in behind the two hedgehogs. "Oh hello Big - and Froggy! You boys sit yourself down and don't wander anywhere." Amy turned towards the stairs. "Steele! Come see Daddy!" she called, dabbing at her eyes.

There was a _THUD!_ as some plaything was dropped and little feet came pelting down the stairs, wheeling round the corner and scampering into the room. Steele stood with his ears pricked and his tail tip flicking in anticipation, perched up on the tips of his toes. He stared at his mother and father in amazement.

"Hey, there's my boy!" Silver breathed, crouching down.

As though that were the confirmation Steele needed, the kitten sprang forward and leapt into his father's arms, pushing his face as deep as it would go into his father's neck, kneading at his fluffy chest and licking Silver's chin as he alternated between purring and mewing.

"It's okay, I'm back," Silver soothed him, stroking the kitten's fur as he held him on his knees, "Sorry I left you so long. Careful of Dada's spines, son. There's a good lad."

Big, as was his polite custom, had taken a seat on the little foot rest (that looked far too small for him to be perched on) and beckoned Silver and Blaze to come and sit down too. He had a great fondness for Blaze and her family and he had been eager to help out when he had found Sonic running back with a very poorly-looking Silver. It had been Big that had carefully cleaned Silver's wounds before their return.

Amy, meanwhile, had gone back into the kitchen to get the phone and Sonic had followed her in the hopes of getting drinks for people. Having punched in some numbers, Amy leant against the wall and listened to the ringing tones as she inspected the handsome blue hedgehog trying to arrange some mugs on a tray.

That was when she saw the bright red spattering on the fur of his lower abdomen.

She was close enough that she could reach out with her free hand and grab Sonic by his arm, forcing him to turn around so she could see where the 'red' was coming from. Her answer was given by Sonic's stomach displaying a scratch, short and not too deep, mostly hidden under his fur which, thanks to the pale peach colouring, did little to hide the blood.

"Um..." was all Sonic could mutter once he realised he had failed to hide his minor injury and had forgotten to take the oppurtunity to check himself for blood stains while Silver had been tending his own injuries with Big.

Amy didn't have the time to grill him about it there and then because just at that moment, a voice was answering the other end of the line.

"Hi, Rouge? Yeah it's me," Amy began, her green eyes boring holes into Sonic which promised that she had a few things to say to him once she was done on the phone. "I-... hmm? Ah, no, nothing's happening in that area yet, no. I was just letting you know that Silver is back and if Shadow could be- Oh, Shadow? I didn't realise you were there."

Amy snapped her fingers aggressively as Sonic tried to escape with the tray of empty mugs, daring him to leave her line of sight.

"...Yes, I was just going to ask Rouge to let you know that- ... ... Yes, Silver's back. ... ... Yeah. ..."

Sonic knew that had his tail been longer, it would be tucking between his legs right now as Amy gave him a stern look.

"Unfortunately, yes he did. ... ... ... I will be sure to let him know." Sonic hated it when Amy talked about him with that tone of voice. "... Ah ah, no! Shadow, you know I don't... ... ... All right, just this once. So long as you're careful. ... Mm-hmm, he's giving me funny looks as we speak. ... ... Okay, I'll see you all soon then. Bye."

Knowing Amy was talking about him with her stern voice was one thing but when she was talking to _Shadow_ about him with her stern voice... well that did not bode well. His child-like green eyes widened in fear as Amy hung up the phone and uncaringly dropped it on the kitchen counter.

She looked at him with eyes half lidded and arms folded - then she tantalisingly turned away to fish out her well-used First Aid kit.

"...Shadow, Rouge and Omega are on their way," she said over her shoulder. "Now come sit down so I can look at that scratch."

But Sonic only wanted to know one thing: "What did Shadow say?"

"Oh he just wanted to know what happened. That's all."

This wasn't good and Sonic knew it.

"What did he _say_?"

Amy pulled him into the corner kitchen chair.

"Nothing he can't say to you himself, _sweetheart_," she replied, inaudibly warning Sonic that he was going to get nothing short of a beating.

Amy leaned over and carefully used her fingers to move Sonic's fur so as to inspect the skin underneath. The wound was over on the side, near the border where his peach stomach fur met the blue fur. Small 'dewdrops' of blood were clung to the lighter coloured hairs where Amy could see they had leaked from a set of very fine and incredibly smooth cuts running from left to right. It would only need a clean and the scratches would heal by themselves in no time at all.

It didn't excuse anything though and she glanced up accusingly at her husband.

"Are you going to tell me the truth about this or are you going to spin me some tale?" she asked.

Sonic looked down at his tummy as though he had the IQ of a fish. "...Didn't even realise that was there."

Amy inhaled very deliberately and then, just as deliberatly, let out a long sigh.

"...Sonic, how old am I?"

The blue hedgehog blinked at his wife, beginning to panic. Was this a test? One of those 'how well do you know your partner' questions? This was the sort of trick she'd pull when it was near to their wedding anniversary. It wasn't their anniversary soon was it? Or her birthday? Her birthday! Was it today!? Was he about to be digging his own grave because he'd stupidly forgotten!?

"Uh..." he replied in a squeaky voice, "...twenty... fffff-six?"

"Correct..." Sonic relaxed. "...So when was I born?"

No longer relaxed! He wracked his brains. He KNEW this!

"Um... Nineteen, ninety thr-"

"It wasn't yesterday, Sonic!" Amy told him angrily. "I wasn't born _yesterday_! I know what a wound from Metal Sonic looks like."

There was no point in denying it. Sonic had learnt, a long time ago, that it only lead to more trouble so he had no choice but to admit defeat and come clean.

"Yeah well you should see _him_," he shrugged and flashed a smile. "He got off worse than I did."

Letting out a more gentle sigh this time, Amy took out an antisceptic wipe and softly began to clean the cuts. And boy did THAT sting! Felt like getting lemon juice in a paper cut.

"I don't doubt that," she told him, "but... Look, just remember what 'back-up' is for, yeah? I know it's hard for you to accept help but we can't run these kind of risks right now. If Metal had done any more serious damage you might not be fit enough to help me when the babies come."

"...I'm sorry, Ames," Sonic said, feeling the weight of guilt overpower the pain of his scratch, "You're right - I wasn't thinking."

Amy smiled at him and finished cleaning the cuts.

"I'm sure you'll get a rematch with Metal before you know it. Anyway, I'm not the one you'll be sorry about when Shadow gets here."

The alarm bells resumed their frantic tolls in Sonic's brain.

"Amy, what did he say?"

But Amy chuckled and rather than saying anything, decided to go and see if Blaze needed any help with getting Silver seen to.

* * *

The front door opened with a _BANG_, causing all the occupants of the house to violently jump and prepare for battle. When they saw it was just Shadow's angry face appearing in the sitting room, they only slightly relaxed.

"_Where is he?_" he shouted, eyes scanning the room. Rouge and Omega had followed Shadow in, having left Knuckles with Ruby back on Angel Island (where they had been enjoying their promised 'drink' before Amy rang).

"Indoor voice, Shadow," Amy winced with one hand supporting her back and the other having just handed Blaze, stood behind the sofa, a drink.

"Where is he?" Shadow shouted again, not as loudly.

"Silver's right here," Amy replied, pointing to where Silver's alarmed face was peering over the top of the sofa. "He's fine."

But Shadow shook his head. "Not him!"

That's when Sonic popped his head round the corner from the kitchen and politely asked, "Can I get anyone else a drink?"

"YOU! Get here NOW!" Shadow bellowed, jabbing a finger in his direction and advancing dangerously towards the blue hedgehog.

"Shadow, for goodness sake!" Amy cried, "Keep your voice down - you'll frighten Steele."

In actual fact, Steele barely noticed that Uncle Shadow was about to beat seven rings out of Uncle Sonic, so content was he with looking through his play pack of cards while he sat on his dad's lap.

Sonic was about to take refuge back inside the kitchen and escape out the nearest window but Shadow caught a hold of his left ear and pulled it - hard!

"You were supposed to FIND him," he loudly yelled down the unfortunate ear. "_FIND_. Not throw yourself in like the glory-hog you are!"

"I _did_ find him!" Sonic squeaked, grabbing Shadow's wrist and waving a foot towards the sofa. "Look, I found him!"

"And were was the call?"

"What call?"

"_Exactly_!"

Grabbing Sonic with both hands, Shadow pulled him from the doorway and threw a punch which Sonic, expecting the attack, nimbly dodged by jumping back. Still having a firm hold of him, Shadow was pulled along by momentum and both hedgehogs went toppling over the back of the sofa, narrowly missing Silver and Steele.

"Not in front of Steele and _mind my couch_!" Amy shouted at them. There was no way that the fabric of the sofa was going to withstand the quills of Sonic and Shadow being raked across them while the pair of them duked it out like pro wrestlers.

Pausing in shuffling his cards, Steele casually glanced at Sonic and Shadow who were struggling on the carpet together in a very suggestive manner and hardly looked bothered by the show of aggression.

"Aw," Silver yawned, his exhaustion catching up with him, "they're fighting about me..."

Rouge, normally one who was entertained by a 'Sonic Vs Shadow: One-on-One' fight, opened her wings and threw a sharp kick into the mass of spines on the floor.

"All right, break it up. Hey! Break it up, I said! Shadow don't you DARE bite him!"

The steel-toe kick connected with Shadow's lung and he coughed painfully, rolling off Sonic (who he HAD planned on biting) and picking himself up with a look of having every intention to resume the fight when the oppurtunity came.

"The place -_cough_\- was radioactive!" Sonic was trying to explain, wheezing for air and wiping at his scratch which had been encouraged to bleed again thanks to Shadow's surprise '_Street Fighter_' reenactment. "Big was with me, right Big? You were there!"

"I didn't go into the radioactive bit," Big said, unaware that Omega had been trying to hand a cup of water to him for the last five minutes. "Too dangerous."

"Right!" Sonic crawled away from Shadow and took refuge at his heavily pregnant wife's side. "I just figured it'd be safer if I dashed in real quickly and got Silver out without anyone having to-" He gave a yelp as Shadow teleported directly in front of him.

"What's this?" the Ultimate Lifeform asked, pointing at the small smear of pale red blood that Sonic had been wiping at on his stomach.

Sonic pathetically looked down. "...A scratch."

With a long moan coming from him, Shadow turned around, took the drink off Omega and leant against the mantlepiece. Silver wondered how funny the situation would be if it broke under Shadow's elbow at that point...

"...You got into a fight with Metal," Shadow said. It wasn't a question - it was an observation.

"Hey I didn't want to stick around!" Sonic replied, stepping forward with his hands up in innocence, "I wanted to grab Silver and go but..."

"I wanted to stay," Silver finished.

Shadow turned from dramatically posing at the mantlepiece while all other eyes turned to the sofa.

"Why?" Blaze asked, sitting down beside him and resting her paw on his knee.

Silver hugged his son who protested a little now, the joy at seeing his father again clearly wearing off.

"...Metal Sonic went to the future." Silver paused and took a breath. "He made me open a portal. I wasn't strong enough to stop the Am-" The word teetered on his lips as he looked up in a panic at Amy while Sonic visibly flinched.

Amy's face was stoic.

"...Amy Doll," she murmured and at a look from Sonic, received all the confirmation she needed.

"_Amy_ Doll?" Rouge said and followed it with a short groan, leaning against the arm of the sofa. "Please tell me you're joking."

Unfortunately, Sonic shook his head. "Eggman has a thing about making robots with specific targets in mind."

"**Unlike the Tails Doll, there were multiple Amy Dolls created**," Omega said, contributing to the discussion.

"Yeah we destroyed them but apparently one wasn't broken enough," Sonic mumbled and moved closer to his wife, protectively wrapping an arm around her. "Now they've got her walking and talking again.

"Yeah well..." Silver popped Steele down at his feet and watched as the kitten begin to spread his cards over the floor. "She walked AND talked - and Metal got what he wanted. I made Sonic leave me because I wanted to know what Metal was doing."

"What on earth does the Amy Doll do?" Blaze wondered but wasn't really looking for an answer. She knew it would only make her cross so she watched her son playing with his cards instead. He always seemed to pick out the Ace of Hearts for some reason.

"Metal wanted to go to the future," Shadow muttered, "Did you learn why?"

Silver held his face in his hands and shook his head.

"At first he said he wanted information about me but it was only information he could get in the future so I didn't get what he was on about," he explained, his voice beginning to speed up as he tried to unload everything in such a short space of time to his listening audience. "Then when he got back he was going on about the Past and the Future and about what connects them and he said you were the Past and I was the Future and-"

He looked across at Sonic. Sonic had been there, in hiding, listening to that entire conversation. He would have heard everything Metal had said about him.

Sonic didn't return Silver's gaze. He still had his arm around Amy and had leant the side of his head onto the top of hers, staring down at her tummy with a distant look on his face.

"...And he mentioned Sonic in amongst all of that," Silver added in a slower paced voice. "I dunno. He was yammering on without making much sense."

Shadow downed the drink of water and rubbed his fingers over his mouth. "...Where is Metal now?"

That's when Sonic returned to the conversation.

"He's unlikely to still be where we left him," he answered, "Amy Doll was with him but there wasn't any sign of Metal Knuckles or the Tails Doll."

Hearing that, Rouge stiffened and her wings twitched up over her ears.

"They didn't say where they were?" she asked.

"No. We didn't see them," replied Silver.

The bat drew in her wings again and kicked her heels.

"...I'm heading back to Angel Island," she announced, already moving towards the door, "If there's a metal version of Knuckles flying around doing whatever he likes..."

"I'll update you if we decide anything," Shadow called after her, understanding that she was probably concerned with leaving Angel Island's two resident echidnas alone.

Rouge left an uneasy feeling in Amy's house after she left.

"All right," Shadow said, "The main thing is Silver's back and he's okay and everyone's in one piece..." He glanced at Sonic with a stabbing glare. "..._just._"

"But I still don't know what Metal Sonic did in the future," Silver went on saying, "I don't know what _exactly_ he's confirmed for himself but, whatever it is, he seems to be pleased with it."

"We'll find out. You just rest up and look after Steele," Sonic told him, winking down at the little kitten prince that had looked up at hearing Uncle Sonic say his name.

"Do you want to stay here another night?" Amy offered, patting Blaze on the shoulder, "You can go back to your own place whenever you want."

Blaze was grateful for the Hedgehogs' hospitality. "Thank you."


	13. The Prodigal Ones

**Writer's Note - **

**Hello! Apologies are in order, methinks. As I've been saying on other sites, I unfortunately went and did the very thing I always advise against which is to try taking on multiple projects. **

**Can confirm - it's way too mentally draining! Hopefully I'll get back on track before long and I look forward to replying to some of the reviews that have been left in my absence. **

**Stay awesome! **

**\- Duma**

* * *

"So the idiot thinks it's a good idea to save Silver all by himself," Shadow complained over his communicator, "Wreckless fool." He was walking back towards GUN HQ with Omega at his side.

"_Mm-hmm_," answered Shade the Echidna's voice over the line, "_And you say this as though you wouldn't have done that_."

Shadow bit the inside of his cheek as he recalled his younger days, days when he bounced from one side of the battlefield to the other. Days when he had complete and total trust in his own strength and dismissed any and every notion that he had a weakness. As far as he had been concerned, he was unstoppable and invincible - the Ultimate Lifeform.

Yes, Young Shadow had been reckless every so often and arrogant occassionally and... dare he say it... very Sonic-like sometimes. To the point where, had it been a younger Shadow in Sonic's place, he too would have charged in to save Silver. But he wasn't going to say that to Shade.

"There IS such a thing as tactics, you know."

"_I do know. Or have you forgotten my military background?"_

Shadow rolled his eyes. "That was not intended to be an insult, Shade."

"_Teasing you. Just teasing_." There might have been a noise like a chuckle on the other end. "_So Sonic's in one piece is he?"_

"Amy forbade me from hurting him too much," Shadow said, aware of Shade's peculiar soft-spot for his irritating blue look-alike, "The most that got injured was Amy's couch."

Now there really was a laugh on the other line. "_Shame on you; I like Amy's couch_."

"Where are you anyway?"

"_Vacationing. Where else? I'm not an all-important GUN agent like you are_."

Shadow looked up at the imposing and unnattractive building that was new G.U.N. Headquarters. "You could be. Easily."

"_Now you're starting to sound like Rouge_..."

"Take that back."

"_When I feel like it, maybe_." There was a few seconds of silence before Shade sighed. "..._No, Shadow. I'm done with all that. It's your world now, not mine. Civil War does that to you_."

"You aren't in a war," Shadow tried reasoning with her, "We've been over this."

"_Maybe I'll join you someday but, right now, I'm good as I am. If you wanted to drop in, I'm in Spagonia_."

"What are you doing there?"

"_I've never been to Spagonia. But while I'm here I heard that, what's-her-name, the princess of Soleanna_..."

"Princess Elise?"

"_That's her. I heard she's supposed to be having a coronation soon. She'll be Queen Elise the... whatever number she is."_

Shadow glanced at Omega but the robot shrugged. "Wasn't aware."

"_I only heard it through eavesdropping. See?_" Shade smiled on her end, "_A vacatationing friend is useful. I get the scoop on things_."

"Well, the Classic Four probably have invitations to that prestigious event," Shadow huffed, "She's fond of those guys."

"_I don't know_," Shade replied cautiously, "_They would do better to keep low profiles what with Eggman's Metal Monstrocities out and unaccounted for_." She made a strange noise of disgust and added, in a quiet voice, "..._Can't believe he built a robot echidna_."

"Still finding it offensive, are you?" Shadow smirked.

"_It's insensitive, is what it is," _Shade answered him, "_With echidnas being almost extinct in this world, you'd think a scientist would show a little respect_."

"Eggman doesn't do 'respect'. He built a robot hedgehog too, by the way. _Several, _by my count."

"_I know. I wouldn't stand for it. If you see them before I do, give them a beating for me. Especially that Metal Knuckles or whoever it is_."

"You're just as capable of teleporting yourself over here as I am teleporting to you. Why don't you help?"

"_I'm having a good time in Spagonia, I'll have you know. The chocolate chip ice creams are delicious. I'll join you when I'm good and ready_."

All around Shadow was the slow patter of the Westopolis public and the engines of taxi cabs and other cars that went grumbling down the streets. No-one was casting a mind to the dark hedgehog and the large ex-Eggman robot that stood at the bottom of the steps of one of the most avoided buildings in the entire city.

Shadow lifted his wrist one more time. "Good night, Shade."

"_Actually, it's nearly lunchtime where I am. But sure, take care of yourself_."

The Comms went dead.

Shadow soaked in the ambience, putting his hands on his hips and closing his eyes.

"...I think all echidnas have the ability to dig their heels into the ground and refuse to move for anyone," he muttered, "No wonder they're referred to as mountains."

Omega, it seemed, wasn't quite ready to discuss the Echidna species.

"**Shadow, what do you intend to do about Metal Sonic**?"

When it came to robots, Omega had a pretty firm opinion: If the robot was a creation of Eggman's and willingly obeyed their creator's malicious orders, it was only fit for the smelter. Omega was known to show no mercy.

"Not a lot we can do until they show up again," Shadow replied, not liking the idea of Omega trying to pick a fight with the Metals, "Which won't be much fun because that will mean we run the risk of another repeat of our last fight." It was unlikely that any of them would try swiping Silver again but, at the end of the day, they weren't sure of their end game.

"**Was Metal Sonic damaged in the fight**?" Omega asked.

"According to Sonic and Silver, yes." Shadow opened his eyes and mentally noted everything he'd need to relay to the Commander in fifteen minuets. "I don't know the extent of it but he did have a portion of ceiling dropped on him. Why?"

Omega made a robotic _Zrrrrr_ as he turned his torso slightly towards his teammate. "**Most robots are able to perform auto-repair on themselves but in the event of heavy damage, Eggman robots have a built in response**..."

"Return to their master for repairs." Shadow looked up at Omega and frowned. "You think that's where Metal's gone? Back to Eggman?"

"**I have learnt to ignore that diagnostic suggestion by uploading Tails as a primary source for repair**," Omega replied, a little proudly, "**Those of Team Metal may work independantly but I'm not sure if they've turned their backs on Dr Eggman completely**."

* * *

When the computers made that shrill bleeping sound, it usually meant that military aircraft were flying precariously close to the hidden base and there was always an option to open fire which Orbot manually had to decline.

This time, the computers weren't bleeping shrilly and there was no option for the artilary to be deployed.

"_Dr Eggman_?" the little red henchman called across the room, "_There appears to be something approaching at high speed_."

Eggman was at one of his whiteboards, scrawling something in marker pen all over it to add to the enormous spread of mathmatic calculations and diagrams that he'd already covered it with.

"Hmm?" He didn't look round.

"_Wait, no_..." Orbot went on, "_I count _three_ signals coming our way. Very quickly. ... Four signals? Maybe_?"

For a middle-aged and rather overweight scientist who had spent most of his life sat behind a computer screen or sitting in a floating egg-o-matic hovercraft, Dr Eggman could sure move when he wanted to and Orbot let out a yelp as he was shoved aside.

"Out of the way!" he snapped and studied the monitor. According to the radar, there were four objects but they were all so close together that it only looked as though there were two. They blipped on and off the screen as they neared the base and Eggman began to smile. "Well how about that..."

"_What is it_?" asked Cubot, pushing his way to the front like a nosy child. He was rewarded in a similar fashion to Orbot and got pushed back.

"I keep forgetting that 'artificial intelligence' was perhaps too much of a stretch to describe you two," Eggman mumbled and flicked the screen. "Check the computers every so often and you might learn something. They're registered in the system."

Orbot's optics widened, "_Then they're allies_?"

Eggman nodded and folded his arms. "...The Prodigal Children of Eggman return."

Orbot and Cubot looked as though they had suffered enormous computer malfunctions.

"_METAL SONIC_?" Cubot wheezed, his circuitry sparking underneath his plating and then, laughing insanely, spun around to flee the room. "_As another famous robot once said, 'asta la vista'_."

"_Cubot, come back_!" Orbot called after him, not wanting his idiotic partner to end up in the scrap pile. He grabbed Cubot's arm and held it tightly.

But Eggman didn't seem to notice Cubot's attempt to run. "Go and open the doors for them."

"_What_?" Cubot cried.

"You heard me!" Eggman shouted, "Let them in!"

* * *

The doors opened slowly, hissing on old hydraulics as the slid back into the walls. Orbot and Cubot shrank back once their task was done, the latter trying to hide himself behind the former as the frightening shape of Metal Knuckles stepped forward. In his arms he held Metal Sonic who, despite looking in desperate need for repair, had a murderous glint in his eyes that dared anyone to touch him. At Metal Knuckles' right foot was the Amy Doll, perfectly balanced on her soft feet as she kept still. At Metal Knuckles' left foot was the Tails Doll, less balanced, more floppy and more interested in his surroundings if his waving antennae was any indication.

Metal Knuckles blanked Orbot and Cubot as he walked forward and stopped in front of Eggman, holding out the battered form of Metal Sonic without saying a word, as was their custom to remain silent most of the time. It was plainly clear that he was demanding that he be fixed.

Dr Eggman hadn't shown any emotion at first but, looking down at Metal Sonic and then taking turns in looking at Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll and the Amy Doll, he hid a delighted grin behind his moustache.

"...Bring him to my laboratory."

Metal Knuckles began to follow and Cubot, perhaps out of sheer panic, discovered his arm moving of its own accord as he waved and stammered out a weak, "_H-hey_?"

"_Cubot_!" Orbot shushed and felt his power source flare dangerously as the two Dolls stopped and stared at them.

The Amy Doll slowly examined them with disdain, the invisible sneer on her expression-less face giving just as burning a sensation as a real one.

The Tails Doll, on the other hand, tilted his head right over so that his neck looked broken and let out a garbled purr which, Orbot and Cubot discovered, was just as creepy and as unsettling to other robots as it was to organics.

"**H-H-HeElllllo!/" **said the Tails Doll with a voice that sounded like a child being strangled.

Orbot and Cubot both made mental promises to never speak to Tails Doll again.

* * *

Through his tinted glasses, Eggman gave a tut. "What have you been doing? Made of some of the strongest metal known to living kind and you've managed to get it torn?"

Metal Sonic lay on his back on the doctor's table, staring up at a familiar dark ceiling with only a single light illuminating the workspace and a little of the area around it. The robot recalled that many prisoners were tortured and interrogated in this room before they were either sent to the dungeons or to the nearest roboticiser.

"Of course," Eggman went on, seeing as Metal Sonic didn't answer him, "I don't know where you've been or how you've been keeping yourself so I can only imagine..."

Off to the side stood Metal Knuckles and the Dolls. Orbot and Cubot were taking refuge over by the doors. When Metal Sonic still didn't say anything, Eggman looked over towards the remainder of Team Metal.

"...What about the rest of you?" he asked, "Everyone in one piece?"

Eggman knew of the strange policy that the Metals had in limiting their communication with anyone other than their Inferiors so he wasn't expecting a verbal answer.

"...Good," he nodded when no-one stepped forward, "My supplies are limited until I can smuggle another delivery behind the backs of the government. Living the life of a wanted man is getting harder and harder." He turned back to Metal Sonic as he picked up a solder and selected a higher magnification on his glasses. "So how was Sonic?"

Underneath his hands, Metal Sonic shook as though he'd been electrocuted and his optics turned sharply to rest on his creator's face.

"Don't look at me like that - I'm not an idiot," Eggman smiled, "These rips and tears in your armour? Hedgehog quills." He could actually curl one finger behind a significant tear in the metal and he ran his fingertip along the smooth cut, recalling the many tears he'd dealt with in previous robots that had gone up against Sonic. "Not like you to allow him get the drop on you. Was he not playing fair?"

Metal Sonic growled and Eggman felt a slight static shock tingle his finger. Continuing with his repair work, Eggman moved aside some wiring, disconnecting the broken ones and replacing them as he went.

"I trust you left him in a similar state?" he asked quietly. The tip of his tongue briefly appeared to moisten his lips.

"**SONIC uSed The eLEmeNt oF sUrPRisE anD WAs gONe beFoRe I CoUld rEtaLiaTE**," spoke Metal Sonic. It had been years since Eggman had last heard his voice. His computerised 'show' voice, of course, since it was the only voice Eggman had ever heard and the truth was that Metal had only begun using it a relatively short time ago. Before that, he had been a mute robot. "**THe SeTTiNg wHerE hiS AtTacK tOok plACe waS Not a FAvOuRabLe oNE**."

"And is that the closest I am going to get in finding out where you were?"

Metal Sonic had gone quiet again.

"You are aware," Eggman mumbled, "I could order you to tell me. I am still your creator, after all."

"**I hAvE BRokEn tHrouGh yoUr coMMaNds, DoCtor**," said Metal Sonic, "**We MAke OuR oWn deCisiONs**."

Eggman frowned and bit his tongue but, nevertheless, kept his voice at a calm pitch. "Well you have certainly shown great intelligence in coming here. Glad to see those homing beacons still work. I don't know if the fact that you can locate me is a comfort or a curse."

"**We aRe noT AgAinst You**," Metal Sonic then told him, watching Eggman's face as the scientist continued repairing. Eggman paused and looked up in surprise. "**We arE InDePEnDeNt fRom yoU - BUt oUR caUse hAs alWaYs BeEn aN eXTenSion of yOur OwN wiLL**."

Eggman seemed to think about this, his brain ticking away so loudly that everyone in the room could have made an effort to hear it.

"...In that case, I won't ask where you've been," he smiled and finished up the internal work. Wiping his hands, he straightened up. "I am, however, impressed that you've managed to find a functioning Amy Doll," he said and turned to look down at the petite hedgehog plush with pride. "Let me take a look at you."

The Amy Doll perked her head up and came pitter-pattering over to her creator, holding up her hands like a child as he stooped down to pick her up. While Tails Doll could reach his creator's knee, Amy Doll only made it halfway up his calf.

Eggman was pleased to feel her weight and to hear the quiet pulsing of her internal systems keeping her active. He had no fear of her like other organics might and he commended the others for doing such a good job in fixing her. But then he looked a tad wistful as he stroked her head and placed her back on the ground.

"I once had a whole batch of Amy Dolls and now..." Eggman shook his head and returned to Metal Sonic on the table, picking up his instruments to move on to the next repair job. "No, that hedgehog will always seek to take or destroy what I've lovingly crafted with my own hands."

"**OUr Inferiors wilL paY**." Amy Doll's little voice made Eggman smile but he knew better than to misjudge her words.

"...Yes. I'm sure they will," he replied. He knew what they meant by the term, 'Inferior'. Eggman cleared his throat and dropped his voice down an octave. "Tails, as I'm sure you may know has an adopted daughter but Knuckles..." He chuckled and looked over his shoulder at the robot echidna. "...Ah, Knuckles has a biological daughter born of his own blood. How far does the extent of 'payment' go?"

Tails Doll looked up at Metal Knuckles and then over to Metal Sonic. Metal Sonic dimmed his optics and Metal Knuckles wrists tightened with a quiet _crrrnk_.

Lacking an answer from Metal Knuckles, Eggman looked down at the robot hedgehog. "...Well?"

It was a serious question: Would the Metals seek to eliminate the offspring of their Inferiors? Would the offspring even count? After all, Ruby may have been Knuckles' daughter but she wasn't Knuckles himself.

_**Unlike me**_, Metal Knuckles couldn't help but think.

"**I haVe YEt tO maKe Up My miNd ABoUt SONIC's iMpeNDinG fAtHerhOOd**," Metal Sonic finally answered.

At the end of the day, Metal Sonic had reasoned, it all came down to what genes had been passed on. He knew that he'd feel more inclined to kill a hoglet born from Sonic if the wretched creature _dared_ to be blue.

Eggman had frozen in place. "...His what?"

There was a heavy silence.

"What do you mean?" Eggman demanded, "What are you talking about?" Behind his glasses, Eggman's pupils had shrunk as his hands began to shake.

Metal Sonic glanced up in interest.

"**YoU diD nOt KNow**?"

Clearly, Eggman had no idea that Sonic the Hedgehog, his arch enemy, had been successful in passing on his genetic code.

"...Sonic..." Eggman hissed in a whisper, "is having a child? Since when? How long?"

"**ThEy're duE this seASon**." The Tails Doll, slumped on the ground with his legs spread wide, just rocked his head side to side and giggled.

"Sonic the Hedgehog is going to be a father soon and_ I wasn't told_!?" Eggman cried, thumping the table with his hand which made Metal Sonic jolt in annoyance.

"It's all over social media, Boss," Cubot whimpered from the back of the room.

"I haven't been able to check _social media_ you numbskull!" Eggman roared at him. "I'm a fugitive! Barred off from the world. Why wasn't it mentioned in the news?"

"It probably was, Sir," Orbot said, "You may have... missed it?"

Throwing down his tools, Eggman turned and violently kicked a nearby trolley, sending it flying back and crashing to the floor as mechanical tools went everywhere. Not finished with his tantrum, Eggman pushed himself back, found a wall, and began pelting it with his fists, shouting at it as though it were solely to blame.

The robots kept quiet as their enraged creator turned his fury on whatever seemed to be nearest him, throwing spanners and other devices across the room and eventually settling on tearing his chair cushion to shreds with his own two hands.

"**WhaT sHOuld bE DeCideD**?" Metal Sonic asked, sitting up as Eggman finished his raging routine, deciding that now the scientist had repaired his internal systems, he could probably handle the rest by himself, "**To LeaVe It Be oR to ENd SONIC's liNe BeFOre it cAn bEgiN**?"

Eggman steadied his breathing and tried composing himself at last for the sake of his watching robots. Tails Doll was giggling again.

"If his child," Eggman said, "has any chance of carrying the Blue Gene then there could be the same chance that it will eventually spawn genetically enhanced Hedgehogs in the future..."

**"BluE GeNe**?" Metal Sonic repeated sharply. That was what he had read about in Silver's files. The Blue Gene was what they had been trying to preserve to create the likes of Shadow and Silver... allegedly.

"It's what we called the abnormally mutated DNA from the Chaos Emerald that must have resulted in Sonic being born with such extreme speed which no-one can seem to explain. It's a Chaos gene really but, under the microscope, it appears blue in colour," Eggman told them, "DNA forged by the raw powers of Chaos. I managed to get a hold of a small sample of it and I preserved it as best I could but..." He shrugged and folded his arms. "It was confiscated and I don't know what happened to it."

Metal Sonic debated on whether to tell Eggman what he had discovered. Should he tell him about his trip to the future or would it better to keep Eggman in the dark about this?

"**DoCTor**..." Metal Sonic said, "...**I HavE inTeREsTing iNfoRmAtioN reGarDIng ThE OriGiNs of SHADOW aNd SILVER."**

Dr Eggman twitched his moustache and lowered his glasses to reveal only one blood red iris as he smiled.


	14. Establishing Priorities

**Writer's Note - A little extra long chapter before plot thickens up more...**

* * *

Charmy put down his cloth as he finished cleaning up the robot that he and Vector had pulled from the sea. It was now hung up in the coffee room at the back of the Detective Agency, hidden behind a curtain that sectioned off the seating area from where they kept the coffee maker and the kettle. Charmy knew it was still going to make him jump whenever he came back here but at least it was a good spot to keep hidden from the accidental eyes of the public.

The rest of the planet were still wary of anything that resembled an Eggman robot and even the G.U.N. were trying to limit how often they used theirs, given that many of their designs were lifted from the evil scientist himself.

It was a good thing that Omega was as beloved as he was otherwise there would be a full on mob with pitchforks storming Shadow's apartment every other hour.

Drifting through from the other side of the curtain came the tinkle of the old piano.

Vector was quite the pianist when he wasn't too busy listening to his own boppy tunes and the Detective Agency always had that classic _Film Noir_ feel to it when he was in full flow.

"What do you think, Vector?" Charmy asked, sticking his head round the curtain. "Think he's worth patching up or is he just a nice piece of decoration?"

Vector was engaged in a slow rendition of some Mozart piece but he glanced up at the sound of Charmy's voice.

"Most of the internal stuff's completely blown," he replied. "If he's gonna walk an' talk again, it won't be us doin' it."

Charmy puckered his lips and thoughtfully looked at the robot. "...Tails could do it."

"Thought Tails would'a been busy with findin' Silver," Vector murmured, getting lost in his piano playing again.

"Oh Silver's back."

"He's _what_?" The piano was silenced with a firm abruptness in mid-note. Vector was frowning at the bee with amazement.

"Back," Charmy repeated, "Silver's back. Cream told me."

"When did he-?" Vector began but shook his head. Once his initial shock was dealt with, he picked up where he left off and Mozart's melody continued on in the room. "Take it he's alright?"

"Dunno about that," Charmy shrugged, opening the fridge and digging out a can of some kind of fizz. "How alright do you expect him to be after a day with Metal?"

"Mmm," Vector agreed, leaning his head back and concentrating on the notes he was playing.

Charmy took a swig of his drink and then parked down on a chair, idly flicking through a garden magazine.

"...There's another storm brewin', Charmy boy," Vector suddenly announced in an ominous way. "Fine ol' storm brewing."

"Then it appears as though I've timed my return just right."

Vector and Charmy, recognising the voice, looked over at the doorway which connected the coffee room to the main offices and there was Espio, living up to his reputation by appearing out of nowhere. They hadn't even heard the front door bell tinkle.

"About time you showed up!" Charmy laughed, throwing his magazine down and leaning back in his chair. "Let him have it, Vec. Go on. Grill him on a spit!"

Vector, who hadn't stopped his playing, raised an eyebrow at the chameleon and smirked.

"Welcome back."

"Good to _be_ back," Espio nodded. He came further into the room and gestured over his shoulder towards the office. "You haven't loaned my desk to anyone have you?"

"Was thinkin' about it," grinned the burly crocodile before he looked serious again. "Better warm it up quick 'cause Metal Sonic is back on the block."

"With friends," Charmy added. "Silver's already had the pleasure."

Espio looked at Charmy with concern and asked, "Is Silver alright?"

"He will be," the teenage bee nodded. "Cream was telling me that Sonic went and found him. Sonic got away with a scratch. Shadow wasn't impressed."

"I imagine Amy wasn't either if they've got a baby due soon," Espio agreed. "Any update on _that_ or did you not bother calling?"

"Don't get yer tail curled up, Espio," laughed Vector. "There's been no sign of Amy dropping a Sonic Jr on us. But go an' take a look at what we've got in the back. Jus' go an' take a good long look."

Espio got to his feet and went and stuck his head round the curtain, giving a start of surprise as he was met with a very dead looking robot hanging up on a hook.

"...An E-Series robot?" he said aloud, noticing the numbering on its front. "And an early one too. Eggman discontinued that line, didn't he? Where did you...?"

"Found it down on the sea-bed with a flamin' warship," Vector replied and brought his piano playing to a soft stop. "...Jus' off the Emerald Coast."

The chameleon knew well enough what that meant; it meant Station Square and Perfect Chaos.

"...Does Sonic know?" he asked.

"Not had a chance to contact him," Charmy answered. "Besides, he's been a little distracted with other things. I mean, this _could_ just be another one of those knock-off robots."

"I'll be happy to see it go if it is," Vector grunted as he got up from the piano. "The thought of havin' a dead robot hangin' round the place gives me the creeps."

"Heh, it's always the robot that you think is out of commission that randomly starts up in the middle of the night and goes on a wrecking spree, ain't it?"

"Thank you Charmy. How's about you volunteer to sleep down here an' keep a watch on it then?"

"What's made you think to keep it around?" asked Espio.

Vector shrugged. "Just'a hunch. We wanna know if it's a robot like Omega."

"And you're trying to work that out while Metal Sonic's been flying around?" Espio shook his head and came and sat back down on the sofa. "Whatever happened to your priorities, Vector?"

"Ah hush up," laughed the burly crocodile. "When there's a moment, maybe Tails can come and give it a once over. In the meantime, pull up a chair, Espio, and tell us about those Jungle Natives."

* * *

Knuckles had two main gardens on Angel Island: a mushroom garden that he liked to keep semi-wild out in the forest, and his little vineyard where he grew grapes closer to home. So close to home, in fact, that he could see it when he was sitting at the top of the stairs to the Master Emerald shrine. Unlike his mushroom garden, Knuckles preferred to keep his grape vine trellis clear of weeds and invading plants and he spent every other afternoon inspecting the soil. They didn't need to be watered because the soil was naturally saturated by the shrine.

The water, being rich in chaos energy, meant that Knuckles' grapes were high quality and Rouge made a cosy side profit by selling them to winemakers when she wasn't delving into tombs and bartering with exotic tradesmen for some valuable jewel. Or on an assignment from the government.

"Hey."

Knuckles looked round to find that another Echidna had made her way to his island which wasn't surprising since she, like Shadow, possessed the ability to teleport.

"Thought you were on vacation?" Knuckles said, sitting up on his knees.

"I was," Shade replied and looked down at her casual attire. "Well, I'd like to think I still am. Just wanted to drop in."

"You know you're always welcome," Knuckles told her a little stiffly.

He hadn't been a part of the old Echidna Civil War that his ancestress, Tikal, had suffered but Shade_ had _and Knuckles often wondered if that was why she sometimes couldn't look him in the eye for very long and preferred to keep her face low. It was the Knuckles' Clan, after all, that had woken the entity of Chaos from the Master Emerald and had caused most of his people to be wiped out as well as imprison the Nocturnus Clan, Shade's people, in another dimension known as the Twilight Cage.

It was no wonder she found it uncomfortable coming here.

"...Can I get you a drink?" Knuckles tried asking. He and Shade were on friendly terms and even found themselves watching each other's backs closer than they normally would for a fellow teammate while in battle but, off-duty, things still had the potential to get awkward.

"No, I'm okay," Shade replied, "I, uh... I wasn't actually planning to stay very long. Is Rouge here?"

"She is, yeah. Inside with Ruby."

"Ah, yes," Shade nodded and smiled for the first time since her arrival. "I've been keeping up to date. Ruby's getting big."

Ruby's birth had sparked worldwide interest and publicity thanks to the fact that Echidnas were on the brink of extinction. Some people feared that there was never going to be another Echidna born so when the media caught wind of the fact that Rouge had safely mothered a puggle, the whole planet celebrated. There was now a website set up which Rouge maintained so that people all over the world could check in to see what new information and updates were available. It was almost like a 24 hour 'Echidna watch'.

"Yeah," Knuckles coughed, "she gets a lot of support."

"Support?"

"From Conservationists. We're high up on the Endangered Species Programme so groups are always sending provisions and things." He almost laughed when he remembered the call they'd had from one very well known Group that had informed Rouge that she'd won a prestigious conservation award for her "ultimate contribution in saving the Echidna species from extinction". It got a bit much when they went on to ask if there were any further plans for _another_ baby.

"Ah, yes," Shade nodded. "It's a good thing I 'don't exist' otherwise I'm sure I'd be hearing from them too."

"I bet."

There was a slightly awkward pause.

"...I thought Team Dark were working today?"

"They were," Knuckles nodded. "But I think Shadow and Omega went to report something with- Oh, did you know about Silver?"

"And Metal Sonic? Yes, Shadow told me."

"Ah, well Shadow and Omega are apparently giving their report on that and Rouge clocked out early." Knuckles stood up and shook his gloves clean of soil. "It's, ah... not just Metal Sonic that we're dealing with. Apparently."

"That's... sort of the reason I came up here," Shade admitted. "The whole Metal Knuckles thing."

Knuckles tensed his shoulders and took a very deep sigh.

"...Last saw him four years ago," he murmured, slowly taking off his gloves and peeling them over his spikes. "Before that, it had been... Er... A long time. Let's put it at that."

"Did you think he was out of commission?" Shade asked, watching Knuckles' hands with discrete fascination. It was the one distinguishing feature that differentiated the Knuckles Clan from the Nocturnus - only those of the Knuckles Clan bore spiked fists.

"More like I _hoped_ he was," Knuckles admitted, taking off his second glove. "Didn't peg Metal Sonic to be sentimental enough to wake him up. Don't even know where he found him."

"...It took me by surprise," Shade said. "I wasn't aware that he even existed until the fight on Christmas Isle."

"Sorry about that." Knuckles tucked his gloves under his arm. "Maybe we should have told you. Actually, I'll be real with you, most of the gang didn't know about Metal Knuckles."

Shade nodded and then straightened up, gripping her fists down by her sides.

"If he's going to show up again..." She hesitated. "...I want a shot at him."

"Should I be worried about the reasoning behind that or...?" Knuckles, without looking at her, carefully took a grape from one of the vines and began rolling it around his mouth.

"The Nocturnus are famil-... _were_ familiar with robots. We had the Gizoids after all," Shade told him. "But we, much like your clan, were proud people and we wouldn't have stooped to such a level as creating robots in the form of Echidnas. That would be insulting to the powers of Chaos..."

"The powers that, 5000 years ago, took wild echidnas and shaped them into the ones we are today," smiled Knuckles. He remembered exploring the old buildings his ancestors left behind and reading all their old tales that they'd inscribed on the walls.

"...Yes." Shade gritted her teeth. "I won't tolerate a robot Echidna. And I know I don't like the idea of one trying to harm a _true_ Echidna." She stopped and looked at Knuckles with her head tilted. "You ARE a Purebred, aren't you?"

"Purebred?"

"You know, one born of a pure species line? Parents both Echidnas, Grandparents all Echidnas, _Great_ Grandparents were all Echidnas..."

"Oh," Knuckles realised, "do you mean if any of my ancestors were a species _other_ than an Echidna? Yeah, no, they were all... They were all Echidnas... I think." Knuckles trailed off and slowly turned to look at the Master Emerald with a frown. "...I think."

"Well Angel Island, from what I've learnt, was hidden until a decade ago and there's been no-one else up here before then," Shade explained with a nod. "And I know for a fact that it split off from the mainland and became an island on that day 4000 years ago because I witnessed it."

Knuckles looked back at her with a inquisitive, almost judgemental face.

"I was sent to spy on your clan and keep a watch on their movements," Shade sighed by way of defence. That had also been when she and the rest of her clan had been sent to the Twilight Cage by the Master Emerald. "Look, what I'm saying is: nothing but Echidnas came up here with it so you _must_ be Purebred."

The Guardian rubbed his fists, looking lost in thought. "...Yeah."

"Sorry to say but we're the last," Shade went on, unaware of Knuckles having a little moment to himself. "Ruby has a Bat mother. There may be Echidnas that survive on this planet but they won't be Purebred. Not that it matters, I suppose; in this world, our time is over. No such thing as 'dominant species' anymore." She watched as a butterfly flitted by her head. "No need to preserve purity."

Knuckles had never really thought about it before; about a continuous Echidna line or having other species marry into it. Knuckles knew he was an Echidna because of everything around him as he grew up - the murals, the paintings, the artefacts and the documents. Not to mention that the Master Emerald continually made him sure of that very basic fact. He had found family trees carved out on the remains of some of Angel Island's abandoned buildings and even the Mystic Ruins gave no indication that other species had married into his line.

Of course, he had been alone when he'd hatched from his egg 30 years ago and he'd stayed that way until Robotnik came on the scene and, behind him, a very fast hedgehog and a two-tailed fox.

_30 years old!_ Knuckles thought in his head. Where had THAT time gone?

"So I won't stand for a robot trying to masquerade as one," Shade suddenly piped up, continuing what she was saying. "If and when your metal counterpart shows up, I want to be told."

Knuckles was about to say something to her when he heard a small voice call out for him and from round the shrine where they'd built their house, little Ruby came hurrying along dressed in her white lace dress. She came and clung to her father's leg, shyly peeping round to smile at the Echidna woman that sometimes visited with Uncle Shadow.

"Oh, hello Ruby-Lei," Shade greeted, giving her a warm smile. Shade had taken a while to warm up to the puggle but she wouldn't have let Ruby know that. Ruby may have been the descendent of her old enemies but that was a very old life that Shade had left behind and now she was aware that every baby Echidna had to be counted as a blessing to their species.

"Hiya Ampty Shade," Ruby replied, flashing her mother's teal coloured eyes. Ruby was fascinated by Shade. Shade and her father were the only ones who looked like her and knowing Shade was a girl made Ruby want to grow up so that she could look as pretty as her one day.

"...She _is _beautiful," Shade murmured, already knowing that Ruby-Lei was going to be a stunning woman when she grew up. Then with a more solemn face, Shade looked at Knuckles. "But will you promise me, Knuckles? Please? For our people."

Our people.

Knuckles felt his chest tighten and something ancient and primitive in him sparked a desire to go off to war and engage in blood-thirsty battle with their enemies but he quelled that fairly quickly as he softly stroked Ruby's head with his bare hands.

"...You have my word," he answered her, making eye contact. Then he glanced at Ruby and smiled. "As a representative of the Knuckles Clan."

Shade found herself laughing and she winked at Ruby. "Yes, as a Nocturnus, I'm outnumbered, aren't I? In which case, _Knuckles Clan_..." She gave an exaggerated bow. "I will take my leave. Goodbye - and thank you."

"Bye bye!" Ruby called after her, waving her hand as Shade walked away and vanished among the trees.

There was a soft flapping of wings as Rouge descended in front of them a moment later.

"Was that Shade?" she asked.

"Hmm," Knuckles replied. "Shadow told her about what's recently happened so she stopped by asking if we would call her if Metal Knuckles turned up."

"Another one who wants a shot at him."

"Well," Knuckles grunted emotionlessly, brushing loose soil from his arms, "you're all welcome to him."

Rouge bent down and picked up Ruby, propping her on her hip. "Didn't realise Shade had a thing about him too, though."

"Something to do with the fact that it's a robot Echidna," Knuckles said. "That's what she doesn't like."

"Makes sense." Rouge and Ruby rubbed noses and was about to say something else when she saw that her husband was staring up towards the top of the Master Emerald shrine with a sorrowful frown on his face. "...You okay?"

"Huh?" Knuckles looked at her with a start. "Oh, I'm fine. Just thinking."

"Oh boy. That can't be good," Rouge smiled but realised that he still wasn't fully with it so she turned to her daughter. "Come on, Ruby. It's nearly time for food."

Knuckles watched them head back towards the house underneath the shrine and Ruby looked back at him, waving her tiny gloved hand at him. Shade's words of being a Purebred Echidna echoed in his head and he found himself feeling a little lost. He was once Ruby's age but he had been born alone. He couldn't remember his early years. He couldn't remember a mother or a father though some nights he would dream of muffled voices from a fleeting, brief memory of being inside the egg.

For as long as he could remember, he'd been on Angel Island, sitting before the Master Emerald, his given task being to guard it though he couldn't recall anyone telling him to do it. It had been an inner feeling that he just knew when he was old enough to think for himself.

Shaking his head, Knuckles took a large lungful of air.

There was nothing he could do to change that. Somethings we never find out and sometimes it was better that way - and that was something Sonic had taught him a long time ago.

* * *

The new 'kid' had only been transferred over to the G.U.N. fairly recently compared to most of the other long standing agents and he was still at the stage when he was expected to do as he was told and not make any fuss until he had established himself as a capable agent to be trusted with more intimate missions.

There were many instances when he had to remind himself of this, such as when he was briskly walking towards the control room alongside an older agent who had worked among the agents of the G.U.N. for at least fifteen years. The younger agent, though young, was still highly trained and, as such, managed to retain his strong military stride and keep pace with the other agent when Shadow appeared from round the corner. His lips parted a fraction to indicate his surprise and he only briefly glanced at the hedgehog's face as, for one tense second, they passed by each other.

"Is that Agent Shadow?" he whispered to his partner once the hedgehog had passed and vanished down the corridor.

"Yes," she replied with her thin-lipped grimace still on her face. "Keep walking."

"Trust me," the younger agent huffed, "I ain't stopping to talk to that guy. I totally get why people say he looks like Sonic the Hedgehog though."

It was well that Shadow hadn't bothered to notice his existence otherwise he may have ended it for that comment.

Shadow had been called by the Commander. It was rare for anyone else to have anything to do with Team Dark and that's how Shadow wanted it to stay. He and his team reported to the Head of the G.U.N. and no-one else. The previous commander had retired and the newly appointed commander had only had his office for about a year.

Shadow had not taken a liking to him at all; there was something... _wrong_ with him.

The Commander was on the phone when Shadow was admitted into his office, a spacious room with an enormous window which overlooked the control room where the younger agent and his partner had been heading.

"Yes, I'm sure," the Commander was saying, rolling a biro between his fingers as he leant back in his leather chair, casually looking down through the window at his subordinates.

Shadow quietly entered and, after closing the door, leant against the wall beside it.

"If the President has concerns about this, he can contact me himself," said the Commander into his phone after a few seconds, "We are on hourly patrols, as I've already said." He looked over his shoulder and noticed Shadow, waving his hand with the biro to him, gesturing to one of the chairs in front of his desk. Shadow stepped forward but didn't take a seat.

"...I'm sorry but I've another appointment to attend to soon so I'll have to postpone this conversation," the Commander said and swivelled round in his chair. "...Absolutely. Goodbye." The phone was set down with a heavy _thuck_ and the Commander stroked his beard as he set down his pen. "Shadow," he greeted emotionlessly. "No Omega?"

"Is he obliged to follow me wherever I go?" Shadow asked in the same emotionless tone of voice he had been greeted with.

"We just see you together so often," shrugged the Commander. "Not broken, I hope."

"He's working as well as I am."

"Excellent. At least, I assume that's excellent. How well are _you_ working?"

"At peak performance."

"Then my previous assumption stands." The Commander raised a bushy eyebrow and glanced down. "You ARE allowed to sit."

"Yes," Shadow replied, folding his arms, "but I'll stand."

The Commander knew he couldn't spook Shadow like he could spook his other agents and he had learnt the easiest way of dealing with Shadow and getting what you wanted from him was to let him do what it was _he_ wanted to do.

"...Well, okay then," he said after he gave a single chuckle. "You've come to give me an update on your last report?"

Shadow nodded. "Silver the Hedgehog is back with us and is making a full recovery."

The Commander pressed a few keys on his computer keyboard although the screen was hidden from Shadow. "...What did Metal Sonic want with him?"

Shadow hesitated, debating on what to tell him. The Commander would want to know the truth but the truth was complicated and would no doubt put strain on the Allies. Silver had been through enough and Shadow didn't trust this new Commander to not want to get involved if he found out what Metal Sonic's plans were.

"...That is something we still aren't certain about," he finally answered which, he reasoned, was partly true. To an extent. "From what Silver has told us, it seems like Metal Sonic was trying to time travel." He didn't say that Metal Sonic had actually succeeded.

"Was he able to find out if Metal Sonic was working for Dr Eggman?" the Commander asked. All interest eventually lead to Eggman and Shadow had been expecting that.

"It's almost certain that he is," Shadow replied. "That robot is disloyal to the point of loyalty. And vice versa."

"Where is Metal Sonic?"

"He won't be where he was left. Apparently he sustained damage."

"Where he was _left_?" the Commander sharply repeated, straightening in his chair and glowering at Shadow. "Were you not there?"

Shadow gritted his teeth and thought of the punishment that he was going to deal to Sonic when he got the chance once Amy wasn't around.

"...I was not."

"And Metal Sonic wasn't captured?" The Commander was growing more and more agitated and he was gripping the edge of his desk.

Matching the Commander's steely gaze, Shadow unclenched his jaw. "No."

Leaning back once again, the Commander slowly took a long breath.

Smoking was against the rules in the G.U.N. headquarters but there were instances, every once in a while, where the Commander felt it was his right to break those rules. Yanking open a drawer, he found a cigar and his box of matches. Once he'd taken a drag, he felt much better and he slowly blew out a plume of smoke as he leant back in the chair, casually leaning on one elbow on the arm rest. Shadow gave a very quiet snort to appease his sensitive nose.

"I suppose," the Commander murmured, "we have Sonic to thank for that." He narrowed his eyes at Shadow, who hadn't answered him, and slowly returned the cigar to his lips for another go. "Well?" he barked impatiently, "Was Sonic miraculously there without you?"

It was all well and good _Shadow_ having a bone to pick with Sonic but he wasn't sure if he wanted GUN to pick a bone with him as well.

"I've already discussed that with him," Shadow therefore told him.

Of course, it didn't do much in the way of appeasing the G.U.N. Commander who promptly bit down hard on his cigar.

"So Sonic _was_ there and therefore responsible for leaving behind a prisoner that could offer us valuable information as to where Dr Eggman might be."

"I was told," Shadow began, "that the conditions of the area where Metal Sonic was found were not-"

"To hell with that!"

Shadow was taken aback by the Commander's sudden shout and he slowly closed his mouth, preparing to stand his ground.

"Shadow," the Commander then said, a little more calmly, "our security detected that during that fiasco with Ira Robotnik, our files were copied. The deadlock files. No-one has the technology to access those files - except, maybe, one of Eggman's more advanced creations." The Commander leant forward in his chair and rested his arms on the desk. "There is a strong possibility that Metal Sonic has broken into those files and if that's the case, he is in the possession of highly classified information. Of course, the previous commander thought to do nothing about it, the fool..."

"Sir..." Shadow started to say but was immediately cut off.

"We need to know what Metal Sonic has learned," continued the Commander. "We have the potential to uncover a conspiracy! A conspiracy that's been brewing away, unchecked, for years." He blew out more smoke and shook his head. "...And I hate to unearth what we've laid to rest but this might be as big of a deal as YOU once were, Project Shadow."

Shadow ground his teeth and lowered his brows warningly as he tried to keep from hunching his shoulders.

"...A friend's life was in question, _Sir_," he muttered angrily, forcing himself to use the respectful title. "Sonic made a call."

The Commander didn't address Shadow's temper but he did furrow his own brow as Shadow had done.

"...With all due respect to him," he said in a low voice, "it is not Sonic's place to make those kind of calls. He's a vigilante. One of a daredevil nature. He may have helped save the planet more times than I'd care to keep track of but, at the end of the day, he's still only a civilian." Another pause, another drag on the cigar. "Now if he were listed and registered..."

"This is a conversation we've had before," Shadow instantly replied. One of the first things the new Commander had done since assuming his role had been to try and register all Sonic Allies under the G.U.N. "Sonic won't and will _never_ join."

"...Then Sonic's authority in 'making a call' is irrelevant," the Commander continued. "Perhaps you could tactfully remind him of that every so often seeing as Team Dark are frequent members of the Sonic Allies?"

It wasn't only that Sonic had turned down the opportunity to work as GUN agent, which was something that Sonic himself hated the thought of, but it was also a decision that Shadow had made on Sonic's behalf. GUN had been eyeing Sonic up for years and wanted nothing better than to use him as a weapon just as they were using Shadow, although Shadow had made a point of making it obvious that his enlistment had been HIS decision alone and he was ready to violently remind people of that fact in the case that any soldier forgot.

He didn't want Sonic working for GUN. As a G.U.N. agent, he would be at risk from turncoat double agents (who often made the once-in-a-lifetime mistake of occasionally targeting Shadow) and would become an easier, more predictable target for Eggman. Better that he keep wild and unpredictable - he would be safer that way.

"Rather than focus on who the blame should go to," said Shadow, "have you anything else you wish to tell me before I take my leave?"

Finishing the cigar, the Commander gave a grunt.

"Thank you for your report. But before you go, Shadow, it's worth mentioning that I think it would be in your best interests to keep an eye on the _Classic_ four."

"What?"

"I am aware that Metal Sonic is not the only robot that was activated on Christmas Isle," the Commander said slowly, peering at Shadow through the faint cloud he had produced with his cigar smoke. "Metal Knuckles and the Tails Doll are with him, aren't they?"

Shadow had been hoping to keep that from the Commander but there was little point in denying it now so he kept quiet, not denying anything.

"Team Dark's ongoing objective has always been to ensure the safety of the Allies," the Commander then began to say, "Tails is a genius and his knowledge has steered us towards technological advancement. Knuckles, as the Guardian of the Master Emerald, is our greatest source of power." The Commander then smiled. "And of course Sonic and Amy are on their way to providing us with more super powered hedgehogs which is something this world sorely needs."

Shadow blinked at his Commander in genuine shock.

"Continue protecting them, Shadow, as you and your team have been doing well for many years."

"The future children of Sonic and Amy may be ordinary hedgehogs and of no use to you," Shadow told him, his voice sounding urgent with how quickly he spoke.

"Is there such a thing as an _ordinary_ hedgehog?" the Commander smirked. "Even Amy Rose... She runs faster than our agents can and her agility would put Olympians and Circus performers to shame. Not to mention the impressive strength it takes to wield that hammer..."

"She's spent her life keeping up with Sonic," Shadow logically pointed out in answer to that statement.

"She'd have given up decades ago unless she possessed the power to do it," countered the Commander. "Embrace the truth, Shadow: you Hedgehogs are highly powerful beings. Beings that seem to be more in tuned with Chaos Energy than anyone else. Your kind could take over the planet if you put your minds to it."

Shadow allowed his quills to flare out imposingly in a threatening stance. It was just as well that they didn't seem to know about the Amy Doll - Amy would be put under heavy guard if the G.U.N. thought she might produce future weapons for them to use. But more than that... if the Commander was aware of how easy it would be for four hedgehogs to dominate the world... what was stopping him from trying it?

"...I know," he growled, "Which is why I would ask you to check your morality every so often. I will continue watching over the Allies because they..." Shadow checked himself for a split second, making sure he didn't accidently say 'friends' by mistake, "...are my teammates and I shall not hesitate to defend them from you too." He coughed and gave his foot a sharp stamp as he saluted. "Sir."

The Commander didn't dismiss him - Shadow took his own leave.


	15. The Beginning of Chaos

**:(**

* * *

Catching his little foot on a tree root, Sonic let out a squeak as he turned head over heels, rolling over the grass and spearing moss on his short quills until he slid to a stop in a miserable, bruised blue ball. It was getting darker and it had been hours since Sonic last saw his family and the scary people that had appeared in his nursery and had chased him and his two littermates.

Sonia and Manic could have been anywhere. Their father had shouted that they run and they obeyed without question, darting off into the forest despite wanting to turn their heads and make sure that their mother and father were following.

Sonic was ashamed of himself. He had always been faster than his brother and sister though he didn't know why and instead of waiting for them, he'd given in to his fear and bolted. By the time he'd realised his mistake, Sonia and Manic were nowhere to be seen and though he had called their names, there was no answer and Sonic was alone.

He would remain alone until, in a few years to come, he'd meet and befriend a young Fox that, at this exact moment in time, had yet to be born. Somewhere out there would be a pink three year old hoglet, unaware of her future. Also out there was a six year old Echidna puggle, playing all by himself on the steps of the Master Emerald alter, high above the clouds where no-one knew he existed.

But 5 year old Sonic didn't know about them. All he knew was that he was all by himself. He didn't know who those people had been or why his father had been so scared or why his mother had been so angry. Or why they had chased three hoglets away from their home.

As the sun was sinking, an owl was preparing for his first hunt of the night and had been considering the squeaking little hoglet as an appetiser but, considering the blasted thing was a ball of spikes, decided to go in search of something softer.

A cold wind sharply cut through the trees, shaking the branches and making Sonic shiver. He heard something snap somewhere behind him and he cautiously peeked up through his spines but saw nothing. Sniffing and rubbing at his face, Sonic slowly got to his feet and shivered again. He opened his mouth and called out for Sonia and Manic one last time in the hopes that it might have been one of them that he had heard. But he couldn't smell them. He'd lost all trace of their scent way back.

He leapt a foot in the air and squeaked in alarm when he heard a gentle but husky voice speak to him.

"_There _you are."

There was a small desperate part of Sonic that wondered if it was someone who knew him - like a friend of his parents. Maybe they'd come to take him home.

With his tail curled under and his ears drooped, Sonic looked round and found an older looking human in a peculiar jacket stooped a little distance away from him, staring at him with awe and delight.

"Hello, little one," he greeted with a smile.

But Sonic felt fear creep up in his chest. This man had a small resemblance to the one that had appeared in his house and had made his father angry. He bristled his quills and hurriedly stepped back.

"No, no, don't run away!" the man said in a soft voice, holding out a hand to him. "I won't hurt you."

Little Sonic wasn't to know that this was Gerald Robotnik, a professor from the past who had come to his future with a very specific goal in mind. No, he knew nothing of that when he slowly dropped onto all fours and hesitantly crawled forward to sniff at the offered hand. There was small piece of strawberry in his palm and Sonic, after a moment to think about it, took it gently in his teeth and chewed it up.

"There, you see?" Professor Robotnik went on smiling, screaming at himself in his head not to do anything too sudden. He'd made it this far and he wasn't about to ruin his chances. "Are you hungry? You look cold. See, I'm a friend. A _friend_."

He (very slowly) retracted his hand to reach inside his jacket and he pulled out a bit of meat which turned out to be a slice of sausage. Sonic watched him with scared eyes, wanting to run but also desperate for more food. The sausage tasted good.

"F-Friend?" he said in a young squeaky voice.

"That's it. Are you lost?" asked the professor. He was keeping Sonic's attention so that the others could take up their assigned positions around the area. They simply couldn't let the hoglet escape from them.

"My... My Ma..." Sonic began to whimper, "and my Pa..." Fresh tears pooled in his enormous eyes and the kind man with the bushy grey moustache went very watery.

"...Yes, I'm sorry," the Professor said in a sympathetic voice and he fished in his pocket for another titbit of sausage. "I'm so sorry. But it's going to be alright. Here, have something more to eat."

Sonic accepted it readily and as he was swallowing it down, the professor risked lifting his fingers to carefully stroke the little hedgehog around the ears, trying to gain the tiny creature's trust.

"Wh-Where's Ma?" it squeaked up at him.

"Shush shush," Professor Robotnik answered and waited until he'd stopped shivering. "What can I do to make you feel better?"

Sonic sniffed and wiped at his face. "Can you find my brother and sis-sister?"

"You have-? You have siblings?" Gerald gasped excitedly. "Are they like you?" He cursed himself when he caused his little hedgehog to jump back in fright but, thankfully, Sonic didn't run away.

"Like me?" he repeated uncertainly.

"Do they run really fast like you?" Gerald asked, putting great effort into sounding calm again.

"...No?"

"...Hmm..." That was a disappointment. It looked like this little hoglet was going to be the ONLY Chaos Born which, actually, made more sense since it was only one blue coloured Hedgehog that appeared in the Echidna murals.

Reaching behind him, Gerald pulled out something soft. "Do you want a blanket?"

"Mm-hmm." Sonic allowed the professor to drape the blanket round his shoulders. The man didn't seem to mind that the hoglet's tensed up quills were poking holes in it.

"Good boy," smiled the professor. "I'll have my friends look for your brother and sister." It was an empty promise seeing as Gerald Robotnik hadn't found any trace of other hoglets when he was probing the future for the Chaos Born. These unimportant siblings of his were probably dead.

Suddenly, Sonic twisted round, ears pinned back and his spines rising again, moving a little closer to the kind gentleman who had given him food and warmth.

"What was that?" he hissed, beginning to shake once more.

"That's one of my friends," Gerald told him and a middle-aged woman slowly emerged from behind a tree, trying to look as friendly and non-threatening as possible. "Look, see? There she is."

"Hi there," the woman greeted. She was wearing the same strange white jacket that the professor was wearing but this time she was holding a small black leather bag. Her face softened at the sight of the small hedgehog and she immediately knelt down in front of him. "Oh, he's _lovely_," she sighed.

She waited until the professor had distracted Sonic with more sausage pieces and then quickly and quietly scanned him with a device she pulled out from her bag. After looking at the readouts, she made eye contact with her superior and excitedly nodded, confirming that they had the right one.

Sonic, who had finished the last piece of sausage, sniffed again and sat down on his backside, looking up at the two humans with innocent eyes.

"A-Are you going to take me home?"

Professor Robotnik raised an eyebrow and adjusted his glasses. The other scientist was smiling.

"...Of course we are," the Professor replied. "But first you need to rest. You're very tired."

"No I'm not." Sonic seemed to looked very puzzled by that. He didn't tire easily - it was something his poor parents had endured for five years. He only slept to allow his brain to process data and to detox from constant stimuli, not to conserve or replenish energy. If Sonic was forced to spend all his time in a plain room with very minimal entertainment then he probably wouldn't need to sleep for days unless he napped to starve his boredom and give his eyes a rest.

"You might not think you are but-"

"I'm not tired." Sonic had developed a frown by now. He sounded typically childish like anyone his age would be when told to settle down and go to sleep. According to science, Sonic would need the usual amount of sleep - or even more - that everyone else needed in order to function properly but, somehow, Sonic defied that logic.

Of course, Professor Robotnik was keenly aware of that fact and so he grinned.

"Okay, fine. You're not tired. You still need to rest though-" Without warning, the Professor wrapped a hand around Sonic's left arm. "Hey, don't struggle," he said as Sonic began to pull away and wiggle, "You'll hurt yourself."

Sonic, however, had decided that he didn't like this situation and his first opinion of the kind man who had given him food was changing. He pulled as Gerald's grip tightened and he used his free paw to try prising the fingers off him.

"Wanna go," he whinged.

"He's so lovely," the other scientist repeated, sighing again as she reached out and grabbed his other arm.

"Stop that pulling," the Professor continued. "Calm down."

"No, I wanna go!" squealed the hoglet, digging his specially made shoes into the ground so he could escape. He didn't know why these supposedly kind strangers were grabbing him but he wanted as far from them as possible.

"Sir, what should we do?" the other scientist asked in concern as two more of her colleagues appeared, realising that there was no point in trying to keep themselves hidden.

"Just calm down, little one. Stop struggling! OW!" A quill had caught Gerald Robotnik on the finger and had sunk deep into the skin. Changing hands, the professor immediately inspected the damage. "Yep, that one drew blood. Get gloves."

"Yes, Sir." Diving into her bag, the second scientist brought two pairs of thick gloves.

It was testament to how strong Mobian Hedgehog spines were seeing as the spines of an ordinary hedgehog rarely drew blood. The other two ARK Workers came over to take a hold of Sonic's legs and discovered that they'd bitten off more than they could chew with that ambitious decision.

"I wanna go!" screeched Sonic, his eyes pressed as he thrashed back and forth, "I wanna go NOW!" With his quills out, he attempted to use them by jabbing at any exposed skin but this was proving difficult for the youngster. He _was_ only five years old and was severely outmanned.

"I've got a Long Hand, Sir," said a fifth ARK Worker, "Do you need it?" A Long Hand was what they called their modified pole with a grabber at the end of it. Apparently it was once used to pull trapped people up out of holes that rescuers couldn't reach or, like now, to keep a savage animal at bay.

"Stop it!" the Professor scolded the hoglet as he narrowly avoided being bitten. "Keep it ready, in case. For now, I just need gloves."

"Gloves here, Sir."

"Get another pair for yourself - I'll need someone to take this arm while I get on with the extraction. Mind those legs."

"Let go! Let go now!" continued Sonic's wails. "You're hurting me!"

"I'm not hurting you," groaned the professor, as though he were simply dealing with a two year old tantrum. "Who has the case?"

"Right here, Sir," announced a sixth and final ARK scientist. "Shall I blindfold?"

"Yes, he's getting too agitated. Hurry up with it," the Professor stepped away from the left arm as one of his underlings took over from him and another went about wrapping a cloth over the screeching hoglet's eyes. "You have his legs?"

The two trying to hang on to Sonic's kicking legs were thoroughly winded and one croaked out, "Barely!"

"Keep him stretched!" Gerald ordered, taking the case and kneeling down by Sonic's head. "If he curls into a ball, we'll have a time getting him out of it."

"Stop it!" cried Sonic. "Leggo my legs!"

"Easier said than done," the first scientist had groaned, keeping an eye on the hoglet's spines.

"Mama! _Mama_!" Sonic called as fat tears soaked his furred cheeks and the cloth that was currently being wrapped around his head.

"Oh he's going off on one now!" the professor moaned and waved a hand to the one who was trying to blindfold him. "Hurry up with that."

"Can't see why we couldn't have given ourselves enough time to come up with some sort of tranquiliser before we came," one of the others (one holding a leg) muttered, wincing as his bruised ribs were kicked again.

"I don't want anything tainting his blood," the professor had told him sharply. "This is our only opportunity to create an ultimate lifeform which will one day save my granddaughter and I will NOT take chances with that!"

Sonic wasn't really hearing what they were all saying. He couldn't see and his nose was overpowered with strange smells.

"Papa!" he yelled but his voice was sore and it didn't sound very loud.

"OUCH!" the scientist on his left recoiled one of his hands back as a blue quill dug into his wrist. "The one spot that isn't protected and he manages to find it..."

Professor Robotnik wasn't paying attention to that. After collecting what he needed from his case, he was now ready to get what he came for.

"Right, here we go," he said in a soothing tone. "There's a good lad. It'll all be over soon."

There was no way he'd get interior cheek cells; the little toe-rag was far too bitey at the moment for that. Which meant that the professor's only plan was to try and extract blood and hope that he'd picked up enough of Sonic's white blood cells for him to use back in his laboratory.

He ignored the cries as he began this procedure, choosing to take Sonic's blood from his arm.

"Sir, please," begged one of the scientists on the legs, "We can't hold these much longer!" Already he suspected three of his ribs had been cracked.

"Nearly there," Gerald replied. "I need as much viable DNA as possible."

Sonic was bound to weaken soon. He'd feel sick but for how long he'd be weak for was something that the professor wasn't sure about.

Seven vials later and Gerald Robotnik decided he'd taken enough.

"There!" he announced. "Okay, hand me the Cortical Scrambler."

Sonic had gone very limp by this time and he was lying on his back looking pale and visibly shaking as he fought dizziness and nausea.

"You've been a great help, little one," he heard the professor say and a hand was stroked over his damp forehead.

"Isn't this risky?" asked another. "Letting the Chaos Born go free? Anyone could grab him."

The professor laughed. "I'd like to see them try. You know we debated this. I was all for humanely euthanising him and burning the body but... I don't know."

"You've always been a superstitious man, Sir," chuckled a different scientist.

"You reckon I'm worried about the wrath of angry Echidna spirits descending on me for ruining their prophecies?" Gerald asked in a joking manner. "...Maybe I am."

As his senses faded, Sonic was unaware that, when he woke, he would have no recollection of a mother or a father or of a sister or a brother. He wouldn't remember his old home on Christmas Isle, nor the orchard where he and his littermates would play. He definitely wouldn't remember the treehouse or the park or the time they got snowed in and made blanket forts around the sofa where they cuddled on cushions and drank hot coco and marshmallows.

"There," the professor murmured after he'd finished. "Now I won't be haunted by dead Echidnas and everyone's consciences are clear."

He wished that were true. In reality, they were all a little sorry they would have to leave such a special little lad to fend for himself without remembering where he'd come from. Taking off the blindfold, he looked so peaceful and sweet now that he wasn't thrashing about and kicking them.

"So when we leave to return home, our Ultimate Lifeform will appear in this timeline?" asked the first scientist.

"Yes. But only after we leave."

"And that's if we're successful in fulfilling Project Shadow."

"Which we will be now." The professor was still stroking the blue hoglet. "Perhaps we can return later on and see if our Ultimate Lifeform meets the Chaos Born. Wouldn't that be interesting?"

"Do you think they'd pick up on anything, Sir?" another scientist asked, busy trying to apply first aid to the colleague that had been on one of the legs. "A connection of sorts between the Lifeform and its genetic donor?"

Gerald's eyes sparkled through his glasses and he paused for a moment.

"...If they did, that would make for an interesting study." He cleared his throat and stood up. "For now, we should focus on making Project Shadow a reality. Here, give me the Chaos Born."

The first scientist gently scooped up the hoglet in her hands and placed him on his front in the arms of Gerald Robotnik.

"What should we do with him?" she asked.

In the end, there was just one thing they could think of. They took him from Christmas Isle and found him a new place to call home - South Island. There they found a small wooded area bordering a huge luscious habitat which was known by the locals as Green Hill and that was where they left him, cuddled in a grassy burrow under some tree roots, nothing on him but his gloves and shoes.

The humans returned to their own time and eventually struck a deal with an alien species known as the Black Arms to help them create Ultimate life by unifying the blood of Black Doom with the hedgehog DNA extracted from Sonic - a little hoglet left far behind in the future.

When he woke, the team from The Space Colony Ark were long gone but he hadn't ever known they'd been there in the first place. He felt as though he'd woken from a very strange dream. One which involved faint, blurred images of his family's faces but nothing else.

All he knew was that his name was Sonic and he was fast. Yes, yes he knew that. He could feel it. Was this his home? This wilderness? It was now. And the blue hoglet had only one desire - to run.

Running made his heart beat faster and that made him happy. His future stretched out before him and he was as free as the wind. His ears flicked as a breeze brushed past him, urging him to get to his feet and use his legs. Sonic was unaware of what lay ahead of him and who would enter into his life. He didn't know where he came from or where he was going.

But he was free and he was happy and he was ready to live.


End file.
